STUDY OF THE 
ITTLE CHILD 



RY THEODORA WHITLEY 




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COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



A STUDY OF THE 
LITTLE CHILD 

FOR TEACHERS OF BEGINNERS 



By 
MARY THEODORA WHITLEY 



A textbook in the Standard Course in Teacher 
Training, outlined and approved by the Sunday 
School Council of Evangelical Denominations 

THIRD YEAR SPECIALIZATION SERIES 



Printed for 

THE TEACHER TRAINING PUBLISHING 

ASSOCIATION 

by 

THE WESTMINSTER PRESS 

PHILADELPHIA 






Copyright, 1921, by 
MARY THEODORA WHITLEY 



©CI.A677846 
YtrA 

Printed in the United States of America 

AUG 14 1922 



CONTENTS 



Chapter Page 

Editor's Introduction 5 

I. What They Are as They Come to Us 11 

II. What They Bring to Us 23 

III. Ways They Feel, and What They Want to Do 35 

IV. Response to New Atmosphere and Relationships. ... 42 
V. Changing Physical Powers 52 

VI. Need of Mental Satisfaction 60 

VII. Reveling in Imagination 69 

VIII. Attitudes Toward People 78 

IX. Modifications of Character 87 

X. Religious Growth 98 



Sunday School Council Standard Course in 

Teacher Training 

Third Year — Specialization 

Beginners and Primary Units 

Nos. 1 and 3 separate for each department. 

Periods 

1. Specialized Child Study (Beginners and Primary age) 10 

2. Stories and Story Telling : 10 

3. Beginners and Primary Methods, Including Prac- 

tice Teaching and Observation 20 

Junior Units 

1. Specialized Child Study (Junior age) 10 

2. Christian Conduct for Juniors 10 

3. Junior Teaching Materials and Methods 10 

4. Organization and Administration of the Junior De- 

partment 10 

Intermediate, Senior, and Young People's Units 
Separate for each department. 

1. Study of the Pupil 10 

2. Agencies of Religious Education 10 

3. Teaching Materials and Methods 10 

4. Organization and Administration of the Department 10 

40 
General Course on Adolescence. Same subjects as above 

but covering the entire period, ages 13-24, in 

each unit. 
Adult Units 

1. Psychology of Adult Life 10 

2. The Religious Education of Adults 10 

3. Principles of Christian Service 10 

4. Organization and Administration of the Adult De- 

partment 10 

Administrative Units 40 

1. Outline History of Religious Education 10 

2. The Educational Task of the Local Church 10 

3. The Curriculum of Religious Education 10 

4. Problems of Sunday School Management 10 

40 
Full information regarding any of these units will be fur- 
nished by denominational publishers on application. 

4 



EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION 

SPECIALIZATION COURSES IN TEACHER 
TRAINING 

In religious education, as in other fields of con- 
structive endeavor, specialized training is- to-day a 
badge of fitness for service. Effective leadership pre- 
supposes special training. For teachers and adminis- 
trative officers in the Church school a thorough 
preparation and proper personal equipment have be- 
come indispensable by reason of the rapid develop- 
ment of the Sunday-school curriculum, which has 
resulted in the widespread introduction and use of 
graded courses, in the rapid extension of departmental 
organization and in greatly improved methods of teach- 
ing. 

Present-day standards and courses in teapher train- 
ing give evidence of a determination on the part of 
the religious educational forces of North America to 
provide an adequate training literature that is prop- 
erly graded, and sufficiently thorough courses and text- 
books to meet the growing need for specialized train- 
ing in this field. Popular as well as professional 
interest in the matter is reflected in the constantly 
increasing number of training institutes, community 
and summer training schools, and college chairs and 
departments of religious education. Hundreds of 
thousands of young people and adults, distributed 

5 



6 Introductory 

among all the Protestant Evangelical churches and 
throughout every State and province, are engaged in 
serious study, in many cases including supervised 
practice teaching, with a view to preparing for service 
as leaders and teachers of religion or of increasing 
their efficiency in the work in which they are already 
engaged. 

Most of these students and student teachers are 
pursuing some portion of the Standard Course of 
Teacher Training prepared in outline by the Sunday 
School Council of Evangelical Denominations for all 
the Protestant churches in the United States and 
Canada. This course calls for a minimum of one hun- 
dred and twenty lesson periods including in fair educa- 
tional proportion the following subjects : 

(a) A survey of Bible material, with special ref- 
erence to the teaching values of the Bible as 
meeting the needs of the pupil in successive 
periods of his development. 

(b) A study of the pupil in the varied stages of his 
growing life. 

(c) The work and methods of the teacher. 

(d) The Sunday school and its organization and 
management. 

The course is intended to cover three years with a 
minimum of forty lesson periods for each year. 

Following two years of more general study, pro- 
vision for specialization is made in the third year, 
with separate studies for Administrative Officers, and 
for teachers of each of the following age groups : 
Beginners (under 6) ; Primary (6-8) ; Junior (9-11) ; 



Introductory 7 

Intermediate (12-14) ; Senior (15-17) ; Young Peo- 
ple (18-24), and Adults (over 24). A general course 
on Adolescence covering more briefly the whole period 
(13-24) is also provided. Thus the Third Year 
Specialization, of which this textbook is one unit, 
provides for nine separate courses of forty lesson 
periods each. 

Which of these nine courses is to be pursued by 
any student or group of students will be determined 
by the particular place each expects to fill as teacher, 
supervisor, or administrative officer in the Church 
school. Teachers of Junior pupils will study the four 
units devoted to the Junior Department. Teachers 
of young people's classes will choose between the 
general course on Adolescence or the course on Later 
Adolescence. Superintendents and general officers in 
the school will study the four Administrative units. 
Many will pursue several courses in successive years, 
thus adding to. their specialized equipment each year. 
On page four of this volume will be found a complete 
outline of the Specialization Courses arranged by de- 
partments. 

A program of intensive training as complete as that 
outlined by the Sunday School Council necessarily in- 
volves the preparation and publication of an equally 
complete series of textbooks covering no less than 
thirty-six separate units. Comparatively few of the 
denominations represented in the Sunday School 
Council are able independently to undertake so large 
a program of textbook production. It was natural, 
therefore, that the denominations which together had 



8 Introductory 

determined the general outlines of the Standard 
course should likewise cooperate in the production of 
the required textbooks. Such cooperation, moreover, 
was necessary in order to command the best available 
talent for this important task, and in order to insure 
the success of the total enterprise. Thus it came about 
that the denominations represented in the Sunday 
School Council, with" a few exceptions, united in the 
syndicate production of the entire series of Specializa- 
tion units for the Third Year. 

A little more than two years have been required 
for the selection of writers, for the careful advance 
coordination of their several tasks and for the ac- 
tual production of the first textbooks. A substantial 
number of these are now available. They will be fol- 
lowed in rapid succession by others until the entire 
series for each of the nine courses is completed. 

The preparation of these textbooks has proceeded 
under the supervision of an editorial committee rep- 
resenting all the cooperating denominations. The pub- 
lishing arrangements have been made by a similar 
committee of denominational publishers likewise 
representing all the cooperating churches. Together 
the Editors, Educational Secretaries, and Publishers 
have organized themselves into a voluntary association 
for the carrying out of this particular task, under the 
name Teacher Training Publishing Association. The 
actual publication of the separate textbook units is 
done by the various denominational Publishing Houses 
in accordance with assignments made by the Publish- 
ers' Committee of the Association. The enterprise as 



Introductory 9 

a whole represents one of the largest and most sig- 
nificant ventures which has thus far been undertaken 
in the field of interdenominational cooperation in re- 
ligious education. The textbooks included in this 
series, while intended primarily for teacher-training 
classes in local churches and Sunday schools, are ad- 
mirably suited for use in interdenominational and com- 
munity classes and training schools. 

This volume, A Study of the Little Child, intended 
for teachers of Beginners, is one of the five units pre- 
pared for teachers of children under nine years of age. 1 
Doctor Whitley's name is a sufficient guarantee for the 
accuracy of its psychology. But the great value of this 
work lies in the fact that, while it gives a most scholarly 
presentation of the little child as he is, it does so with 
a charming simplicity of style and in language unen- 
cumbered by technicalities. As a textbook this work 
cannot fail to interest as well as render valuable service 
to all teachers engaged in the religious education of the 
tiny children who are just beginning to learn the great 
truths of life. 

For the Teacher Training Publishing Association, 
HENRY H. MEYER, 
Chairman Editorial Committee. 

For the Westminster Press, 

JOHN T. FARIS, 

Editor. 



: The others are the companion to this volume, A Study of the Primary 
Child, Story Telling for Beginners and Primary Teachers, and separate 
books on method for the two groups. 



CHAPTER I 
WHAT THEY ARE AS THEY COME TO US 

Ten, fifteen, twenty or more little people brought into 
the Beginners Department, and all of them so differ- 
ent ! Not only in the more obvious things such as size, 
coloring, shyness, talkativeness, but in the more hidden 
things of mental make-up, disposition, ability to learn 
are these children absolutely separate and distinct. Let 
us see what some of the reasons for this individuality 
are. 

There is first of all the big fact of heredity; then 
whether a child is a boy or a girl ; then whether he is 
just four or nearly six years old ; then the kind of train- 
ing he has had, chiefly at home, but also on the street. 
We will consider heredity first. 

Heredity. — A good way to take stock of the chil- 
dren is to find out all you can about their parents. No 
child is exactly like cither father or mother of course, 
but nearly nine tenths of his intellectual power and tem- 
peramental peculiarities comes from his ancestry. It 
has been said that to know a child so as to be able to do 
anything worth while with him one ought to begin with 
his grandparents. It would be helpful, indeed, if you 
could know not only both parents but all four grand- 
parents, for from these six people comes about three 
quarters of all a given child's original make-up. The 
other quarter comes from all the previous ancestors, 

11 



12 A Study of the Little Child 

whom you may call up in your mind's eye stretching 
back four, five, six generations, each individual con- 
tributing his or her share to the traits and possibilities 
which that little four-year-old has inherited. 

A child may be apparently unlike his parents but 
show some characteristic handed down from some one 
further back in the line. A child of pure racial breed 
may show his lineage very clearly, be it Scotch, 
Swedish, Irish, Italian. The more mixed ancestry 
there has been, the more variability we are likely to find 
among the children in one family, or the more conflict- 
ing tendencies in one child. It is less easy, then, to 
know what to expect from a child two or three genera- 
tions after there has been intermarrying of stocks than 
it is from a child whose family lines are relatively pure. 

Get to know the parents, however. — A nervous, 
excitable child may be better explained that way, so 
also the stolid, seemingly stupid one, and the quiet ob- 
servant one, the timid weak one, the sulky one, the stub- 
born one, the doggedly persistent one. Remember 
that, after all, at four or five years old, all the various 
traits a child has inherited do not show ; some will de- 
velop later, especially in the teens, and most are only in 
the budding stage. Some that a child shows in a raw 
sort of way have probably been considerably trans- 
formed in the parents' characters. 

Personal variations. — Boys and girls are already 
a little bit different from each other even at four years 
old. The boys may seem a little bit more independent, 
able to stand pain rather better, will be interested in 
constructive work rather than wanting to have things 



What They Are as They Come to Us 13 

look pretty, may notice and know colors less well than 
girls, and will, age for age, weigh slightly more and be 
jnst a little taller than girls. Also the child who seems 
most different from the group, brightest or dullest, will 
more often be a boy than a girl. 

Five-year-olds have all the advantage over four-year- 
olds that an added fifth of a lifetime can bring. There 
is so much more that they can do, so much more they 
have learned in the way of ideas and words, so many 
more times they have had the chance of being helpful, 
of being with other children, that usually it is better 
to have them in separate groups in the department. 
Otherwise, if the methods and ideas are really adapted 
to one set of children, the others will be a misfit. 

Environment. — Another big cause of the differ- 
ences among children is the kind of environment they 
come from. You cannot expect the same sort of be- 
havior from children who have had a small portion of 
time from a busy mother of the day-laborer, or profes- 
sional, or business-woman type, as you would from 
children who have had almost the whole of their moth- 
er's time and attention. Those who spend most of the 
day on the streets in charge of a sister a little older, or 
in no one's charge, will not be the same as those who 
have been in the keeping of "hired help" of various 
grades, nor as those kept under mother's watchful eye 
the whole time. Neither will children living on a farm, 
in the country, in remote mountain regions, small 
towns, villages, city suburbs, crowded city districts, be 
alike. Their common, everyday knowledge, their inde- 
pendence, their sociability, their assurance, their self- 



14 A Study of the Little Child 

assertion, their sympathy, are all conditioned somewhat 
by the kind of environment in which they live. So, then, 
it is wise to know not only the parents but also the daily 
surroundings of the children, especially the neighbor- 
hood in which they live. 

Physical, mental, and spiritual nurture. — Vital 
statistics show that more babies die in the first months 
of life than at any other age. The child who lives past 
his second birthday has passed the first great critical 
period of existence, and has an increasingly good 
chance to survive. But there are so many dangers 
threatening these young lives that it would be strange, 
indeed, if all the children in the entering class were per : 
fectly strong and healthy. In addition to the peculiari- 
ties of constitution they have inherited, these babies 
have to run the risks of improper feeding, poor train- 
ing in hygienic habits of all kinds, developmental dis- 
orders of various sorts, and ever-present infections. No 
two children will be alike physically at four years old. 
The age between two and six is sometimes called the 
neglected age, for the reason that while the maternity 
center and baby clinic may give help and advice for the 
wee ones, and the public-school authorities will oversee 
the health of those of school age, there is nobody 
specially to care for those in between. True, if a child 
is actually ill, a doctor or a nurse will help ; but it is in 
the preventive and constructive work that we have as yet 
not realized the social need in the care of children from 
two to five or six. Yet this is an important period for 
building healthy bodies for healthy minds to live in. 
In a district where the population is dense, or is com- 



What They Are as They Come to Us 15 

posed perhaps of many foreigners, it may become the 
privilege of the Sunday-school teacher to assist mothers 
to a better physical training of their little ones. Not 
that poor or immigrant parents are the only ignorant 
ones by any means, but sometimes the need is more 
striking. It gives a chance for the church to get in 
touch, through its mothers' club, with the less accessi- 
ble mothers, and give some much needed help for this 
age. 

Although two children may be just four, or four and 
a half, it does not follow that they are alike in develop- 
ment. The physiological age of the two may be quite 
different, meaning by that the general maturity of the 
body, especially the hardness of the bony structures, the 
protectedness and use of the nervous system shown in 
the control a child has of coordinated movements. 
Neither need the mental age be the same. Depending 
chiefly on heredity, one child may easily be half again 
as intelligent at four as the one in the next little chair. 
Starting thus unequally endowed, the child with the 
superior mental inheritance will probably also have 
reaped the benefit of training which the parent or par- 
ents above the average in intelligence have given him. 
He will also have been able to gain more from his en- 
vironment than children with average or inferior men- 
tal inheritance. Some day we shall do in all our public 
schools what the best experimental private schools are 
now doing — admit- a child to school on the basis not of 
which birthday he has passed, but on his physiological 
and mental age combined, as determined by suitable 
tests. Certain it is, we ought to grade them, and pro- 



16 A Study of the Little Child 

mote them, once in school, by the use of intelligence 
and educational tests as our more progressive public- 
school systems are now doing, and not hold blindly and 
rigidly as so many Sunday schools do to the physical 
age alone. 

If you are in a large city where it is highly probable 
that before 1924 all children can easily be tested for true 
mental age, a simple way of placing a child in the group 
where he rightfully belongs will be to find out in what 
grade he is in the week-day school, and with what age 
children he prefers to play, then grade him correspond- 
ingly. Otherwise, be on the lookout for those who give 
evidences, of good intelligence in the course of ordinary 
teaching. As later chapters will indicate, some special 
signs to look for are : a large vocabulary, the use of 
relatively more adverbs, and relational words with bet- 
ter constructed sentences, quickness in learning some- 
thing new, power to remember over a longer period of 
time, ability to give more sustained attention. The 
fore-exercise suggested for the next chapter will re- 
veal some clear differences between children as well as 
the typical reactions for the age ; it may help single out 
the unusually bright ones. When promotion time 
comes, see that those of undoubtedly superior ability are 
placed perhaps as high as the second grade if they can 
understand the work there ; and do not push ahead the 
very dull ones even though they may be six years old. 

If the entering group are markedly different in 
things physical and mental, they are equally unlike in 
social development. Here the biggest factor has been 
the environment, chiefly the personalities in the family. 



What They Are as They Come to Us 17 

Here is a child whose father is just as much interested 
in his training as the mother, who has made himself 
jolly companion as well as strong protector. Here is 
another who knows father only as some one who is 
home on Sundays, who can't stand noise, who will be 
told of the naughty things done. Here is one child 
who knows God as a word to swear by; another who 
has been taught nothing at all about God or Jesus; 
another who has had Bible stories told him since before 
he can remember. Here is one who singsongs "Now 
I lay me" to the accompaniment of athletic exercises; 
another who is admired by visitors as she kneels and 
begs "Pity my simplicity" ; another who has never been 
taught any prayers or been prayed with ; another who 
sits or kneels unwillingly while father rattles off a lot 
of unintelligible sentences ; another who talks freely to 
a heavenly Father in his own words ; another who 
proudly gabbles a list of his family, relatives, and ac- 
quaintances prefixed by "God bless" ; another who has 
been taught a formula for use at meal times, but is not 
sure of either words or pronunciation — and so it goes. 
Here is one in whose home there is constant, natural 
referring of actions, hopes, gifts to God ; another who 
has been sent to school "to be taught religion" as well 
as to get him out of the way for a while on Sunday. All 
these, and so many more variations in conditions you 
may find. 

Family life. — In one home of wealth parents and 
children may be almost strangers, while servants and 
governesses wait upon the children and regulate their 
daily life. In another the mother may be capricious, 



18 A Study of the Little Child 

haphazard, and variable, thinking, more of her own con- 
venience than of what the children are learning. She 
will promise, or threaten, but fail to* carry out her word ; 
be roused one day to amusement, another day to irri- 
tated punishment by the same act on the part of the 
children. In another home a wise mother may have 
realized her responsibilities from the earliest hours, see- 
ing to it that good impulses were fostered and re- 
warded, that undesirable impulses and questionable 
conduct never went disregarded and always resulted un- 
pleasantly. In one home the parents are not in har- 
mony as to their aims and methods ; what one forbids 
the other will permit. One gives in to wheedling and 
coaxing ; the other does not. Can you guess at the 
differences in the children these types of homes will 
produce ? 

Except for the little unfortunates of the tenement 
house whose play place is the street and whose mothers 
are overly busy all day, it is safe to say that the influ- 
ences of the family have been- the biggest factor in the 
development of children up to four or five years old. 
Father and mother, brothers and sisters, occasional 
grandparents, uncles, aunts, have been the dominant 
personalities in. their acquaintance. What goes on in 
the home, the way each member of the household treats 
the others, the kind of talk at mealtimes, idle gossip, 
complaining, intelligent discussion of affairs, the "at- 
mosphere," be it of faultfinding, loving interest, mean 
teasing, quick generosity, sarcastic jealousy, humorous 
enjoyment, avaricious money-getting, loyal honorable- 
ness — all these have molded the little children at their 



What They Are as They Come to Us 19 

most plastic age, leaving lines of beauty or ugly scars 
never to be entirely effaced. 

All our most recent psychology emphasizes the im- 
portance of early emotional impressions. It is ex- 
tremely serious for children under three or four to be 
thoroughly frightened, badly repressed, or so treated 
that they conceive a violent dislike for some one. Such 
experiences may have a lifelong effect ; indeed, in chil- 
dren with a weak or unstable nervous inheritance they 
become a sort of poison center with all sorts of abnor- 
mal results emotionally, mentally, or morally breaking 
out from them in adult life. Less striking, but equally 
true is the outcome of poor, or delayed training in 
obedience, in learning not to cry, to wait for a coveted 
pleasure, to give up one's own way, all of which are 
foundations of self-control. Homes differ so much in 
these respects that it is well-nigh impossible to explain 
a given child's behavior without some observation of 
the way he is treated in the family, and the kind of 
atmosphere there is there. 

Companions. — Yet another thing that accentuates 
the difference between two children even from the same 
family is the effect of being with other people. If their 
dispositions are not alike to start with, they will fre- 
quently have met such treatment from those around 
them as will tend to increase that difference. A shy 
child gets neglected where a self-assertive one has won 
attention. A whining child or one with a bad tem- 
per has been so disagreeable that people have given in 
to him and so fastened bad habits on him more securely. 
A sly child has gained pleasure or avoided blame and so 



20 A Study of the Little Child 

learned to be more sly. A very selfish child with no 
companions his own age may never have learned to 
share. And so it goes. 

As a matter of fact, children of four seldom do have 
companions their own age unless they live in a very 
populous neighborhood. Other children in the same 
family separated only a year or so in age are consider- 
ably removed from them in interests. From two and a 
half to four is an enormous distance when measured 
in terms of development ; so also is from four to nearly 
six. Children of over five are likely to be going to kin- 
dergarten, so do truly meet, a similar aged group with 
more equalized capacities. An only child is particu- 
larly handicapped, but less seriously so- than at eight or 
nine years old. He may now appear a quaint little 
grown-up in many ways, with tricks of speech and 
manner caught from his adult companions. He may 
show excessive aloofness or blatant aggressiveness to 
cover up the shyness when brought into contact with 
other children. Look out for these, as well as for other 
timid unwilling ones on their first day in the Beginners 
Department. There are sure to be some. 

Whether a child is the first, or fifth, or last born may 
make a difference in his general make-up, partly from 
the state of health and vigor of relatively young, mature, 
or older parents ; partly from the different treatment a 
child gets according to his numerical position in a fam- 
ily. One who at four years old is the oldest, with 
younger ones toward whom sympathy is shown, for 
whom little acts of service have been done with moth- 
er's guidance, may be much more ready to assume re- 



What They Are as They Come to Us 21 

sponsibility than another child the same age who him- 
self holds the position of baby in the family. But this 
latter often gets the benefit not only of the training the 
parents give him directly, but of that previously given 
the older ones which they pass on, and which has cre- 
ated a social tone in the home with regard to things per- 
mitted, forbidden, encouraged, found amusing, and so 
on. There is less experimenting necessary, as it were, 
and frequently a more ready acceptance of the stand- 
ards set up since there are several others conforming to 
those same standards by habit. 

To sum up then. Find out all you can about each 
child's parents, grandparents, size of family, home life, 
neighborhood influences, previous physical conditions, 
any peculiarities, in order that you may know better 
why he acts as he does, and make allowances for him 
accordingly. It is absolutely false that all are born 
equal either physically, mentally, or socially ; and we 
must take into account just what capital a child has to 
start out with. Of him who has little, less may be ex- 
pected ; to whom much is given, of him more must be 
required. 

Exercises 

1. If you can conveniently do so, spend a morning 
in a day nursery, watching children about four years 
old. Or arrange a party for fifteen or more little ones 
and observe them in the same way. Look for the dif- 
ferences among them as shown in their play occupa- 
tions, in the way they respond to the person in charge, 
to a visitor, to the announcement that a meal is ready. 
What differences in training do they show in matters of 



22 A Study of the Little Child 

cleanliness, table manners? Are there any fights? If 
so, what caused them? 

2. Look up in a health book or encyclopaedia the 
most frequent age for scrofula, rickets, whooping 
cough, first infection of tuberculosis. What are some 
of the after effects of infections such as scarlet fever, 
syphilis, measles, meningitis? What does this sug- 
gest? 

3. Make up a list of questions you would like an- 
swered about each child's background, covering the 
points suggested in this chapter. It might be well to 
plan the arrangement of a card 7 x 5 to be kept on file 
showing concisely all the information gathered as to the 
individuality of each child. 

4. What are children who are herded in orphan 
asylums likely to be like? Why? 

5. Give illustrations* of any of the things sketched 
in this chapter. 



CHAPTER II 

WHAT THEY BRING TO US 

Fore-Exercise 

1. Get a colored picture with plenty of action in it, 
and show it to several four-year-olds, saying these 
words (and nothing else), "Tell me what you see in 
this picture." Write down exactly what they say. 

2. With a four- or five-year-old, say "You have seen 
a pencil, you know what a pencil is, tell me, what is a 
pencil?" Write down exactly what he says. Try also 
for the meanings of spoon, ball, story, blue. 

Bring to class the results of your experiment. Show 
them to the instructor, and compare with what others 
have found. 

[In the discussions that follow some notice will be taken of 
three-year-old children's capacities ; for although they do not 
rightfully belong in the Beginners Department they mny 
sometimes be found there, unless the school is large enough, 
and well organized enough, to have a Cradle Roll class. Be- 
sides, sometimes we can understand four-year-olds better by 
thinking of the years before four which have helped to make 
them what they are.] 

So far we have emphasized the differences between 
children ; from now on we must think rather of what is 
true of the majority. Suppose we picture a group of 
fifteen children of each age; then in discussing their 
abilities, interests, and tendencies the facts stated will be 
true more or less of eight or nine of them. Two or 
three of the fifteen will have less ability and one will be 
noticeably less well endowed ; two will be more ad- 

23 



24 A Study of the Little Child 

vanced than the majority group, and one quite superior. 
Sometimes we shall be able to indicate roughly what the 
limits of variation are ; more often it means observing 
the children carefully, reporting exactly what they say, 
what they do, how quickly or how often they do it. 

Acquirements. — Children much under four may 
seem inattentive when spoken to, but ordinary four- 
year-olds should be able to attend willingly and listen 
to simple requests in language they can understand. It 
is a safe rule to make sure that you do get their atten- 
tion, however, when you are going to give any direc- 
tions, otherwise you cannot be sure they have taken in 
what you say. 

Three-year-olds can repeat short sentences of four or 
five words after you, four-year-olds sentences nearly 
twice as long. The oldest of the five-year-olds can gen- 
erally carry in their memory simple commands involv- 
ing two or three different things to be done in order, 
such as "Put this box on the table, then pick up that 
chair that has fallen, then bring me that book over 
there." Some would forget one of the tasks, or do 
them in the wrong order ; but the older ones could carry 
similar directions out pretty well provided they listened 
attentively and had them repeated a second time. For 
younger children you should give but one thing to be 
done at once. 

In getting names and ages even for the Cradle Roll 
class you will find most three-year-olds can tell you 
their full name ; some of the four, and pretty surely the 
five-year-olds will know how old they are, but it might 
be safer to get the birthday from the parents, certainly 



What They Bring to Us 25 

for the younger ones. A few of the older group will 
know the names of the primary colors without having 
been taught them directly, but voir cannot be sure of 
this with the younger ones. This does not mean they 
cannot see the difference between blue, yellow, red and 
green, but it does mean speaking of one "like this" 
rather than calling for "the blue" if you want a particu- 
lar color used. Similarly for shapes such as triangle, 
circle, square. If you show them pictures they will sel- 
dom speak of the colors in them. The smaller children, 
when asked what they see will call off a few objects, 
such as "a baby, a man, a horse" ; the brightest of the 
five-year-olds may tell you what is being done in the 
picture thus, "The baby is crying; a man on a horse." 
The common-sense attainment of four-year-olds is 
shown by their knowing what is the right thing to do if 
one is sleepy, or cold, or hungry. 

Vocabulary. — It is difficult to make any general- 
ized statement as to the number of words children know, 
for four reasons. In the first place, children from three 
to five talk so continuously that it takes an expert to 
record accurately all the words they use. In the second 
place, they learn from four new words a week to per- 
haps a hundred a month, by fits and starts. In the 
third place, it makes considerable difference whether 
they learned to talk early or late in infancy. In the 
fourth place, it depends not only on their native intelli- 
gence, but very much on the kind of homes they come 
from. We must remember, too, that they can under- 
stand a larger number of words than they use in their 
own talk. Several studies show that the average num- 



26 A Study of the Little Child 

ber used by three-year-olds is 1,400, by four-year-olds 
over 1,800, by five-year-olds over 4,000. However, these 
are reports from children in cultured homes who were 
probably superior in intelligence. There are records of 
900 for a four-year-old, and 1,500 for a five-year-old, 
both of whom were late in learning to talk. Steno- 
graphic reports for a whole day show one four-year-old 
to have used 731, another 859, another 999 different 
words out of a total used during the day of from ten to 
fourteen thousand. There were barely five consecutive 
minutes in the day when these small people were not 
talking. One child asked 23 questions an hour, another 
33 on the average. The word "mama" came about 
40 times an hour for one child, the pronoun "I" once in 
every ten words for another. 

About four fifths of all the different words they use 
are nouns and verbs ; then come adverbs, adjectives, and 
pronouns, and, a very long way last, prepositions and 
conjunctions. The year from five to six shows a large 
relative gain in the last three kinds of parts of speech. 
We see, then, that children's main interest is in things 
and actions, and that their power of expressing logical 
connections, or, indeed, any relationships, is very limited. 
People, objects, and actions having to do with personal 
daily life are named first; descriptive terms are few in 
number. Words learned from objects in pictures or 
from stories heard are more often and more easily for- 
gotten than words learned by direct experience with 
things. If asked what the meaning of words are, the 
reply will be something like, for hat, "That is papa's 
hat. He puts it on" ; for chair "to sit on," for less con- 



What They Bring to Us 27 

crete ideas such as town it may be "to go in." Words 
like high, big, close by, may be understood, but deep, 
narrow, lean, near, are samples not usually in the vocab- 
ulary. So, too, children are likely to say biggest rather 
than bigger, highest instead of higher. Asked which 
of several objects they like best, they may point to each 
in turn saying, "I like this best, and this best, and this 
best," showing no real grasp of the abstract idea of 
comparison, though they may make no errors in picking 
out the biggest, or heaviest of some easily distinguish- 
able objects. 

Three-year-olds' sentences are short and generally 
with errors in grammar and pronunciation. Four-year- 
olds' sentences will contain from four to ten words; 
they are simple, lacking dependent clauses since the use 
of connecting words, even relative pronouns, is so lim- 
ited. "The kitten which I saw in the garden did not 
come in although I called it" is not a child's sentence in 
form or word usage. Five-year-olds' sentences are 
longer and better put together ; also the difficulties with 
pronunciation are mostly conquered. 

Most untrained visitors to either the Beginners or 
Primary Departments make the mistake of employing 
language and style quite beyond the range of their au- 
diences — a great strain on anybody's attention. Is it 
any wonder they complain of poor order while they are 
talking ? 

Content of knowledge. — Children's ideas of dis- 
tance are good when it is possible for them to judge by 
using muscular actions such as reaching; but when it 
comes to distances which cannot be so measured their 



28 A Study of the Little Child 

ideas are very vague. Comparisons of familiar land- 
marks such as "from your house to the grocer's on the 
corner," "as far as going from the church here to the 
bridge'' will be of use, but it is no help to speak of the 
distance one could walk in twenty minutes, for ideas of 
time are still more dim. Time cannot be seen or felt, 
you see. Some children think it lives in the clock, some 
look to see where it "passes." Expressions such as 
"time to get up," "dinner time," are understood, be- 
cause of the action involved ; but terms like yesterday, 
last zveek, to-morrow, hours, are a great puzzle for most 
four-year-olds. If they understand "last Sunday," it is 
because different things to do, places to go, people to 
see, clothes to wear have helped make a definite connec- 
tion. Because this sense of time is so undeveloped it 
is difficult for children of four to recount' an experience 
in detail ; they can neither date things accurately in the 
past nor recall the order in which they happened. Also, 
as we have seen, they cannot narrate connectedly. Pa- 
tient and skillful questioning may help bring back a 
number of details, however. 

Children of three or four have little idea of number. 
Pointing to objects and counting as far as four is within 
the ability of most five-year-old children, but that need 
not involve a real comprehension of what the numbers 
mean. It is the rhythmic act of counting even up to 
high numbers that is part of its joy; and this pleasure 
finds exercise in memorizing a deal of rhymed, rhythmic 
material of the Mother Goose order. Here, curiously 
enough, the words and ideas may be unintelligible or 
nonsensical, the sentence structure may be long and 



What They Bring to Us 29 

complex — it matters not to the little declaimer, who, 
half hypnotized by the swing of the meter will reel off 
thirty or forty lines with very little assistance from pic- 
tures or prompting. 

Allied to this verbal memorizing, but less rhythmic, is 
the familiarity with favorite stories. The adventures 
of Peter Rabbit can be told verbatim by many a small 
person who cannot read ; and woe be to the adult who 
varies the language in retelling a well-worn favorite tale 
to closely attentive critics of four or five. Even when 
they cannot themselves repeat a story they can correct 
alterations in the reading of it ; whereas sometimes they 
cannot retell anything unless they recall the exact words 
for use. 

An obvious danger here is that you may suppose they 
understand what they rattle off so glibly. A probing 
into their actual knowledge would warn you that it 
never pays to take for granted that even common, 
everyday facts are known by little children. You must 
take into account, too, that city children will not under- 
stand about sheep, gardens, mountains, the sea, grain 
fields, if you want to bring these into your Bible stories. 
It has been found that even at six years old many city 
children did not know such things as where the sun 
rises, where their hearts were, where milk, eggs, apples, 
potatoes come from other than the grocer's. Things 
outside constant daily experience will seldom, if ever, 
be understood ; and abstract words, for even such well- 
known emotional states as joyful, sad, are not appre- 
ciated. Particularly is it true that an abstract thing is 
never thought of when a concrete object is looked at ; 



30 A Study of the Little Child 

thus a flag does not signify loyalty, nor a circle perfec- 
tion, nor a sphere unity, as our symbolists would urge. 
Indeed, one object never means another object for a 
child unless both are known. A block may be a house, 
a person, an animal, or anything else chosen in the 
make-believe game so long as there has been actual ex- 
perience with that something else. 

It is right here that we may make big mistakes in 
teaching, using symbols in the way of words, marks, or 
signs which have so long held meaning for us that we 
do not appreciate the absolute barrenness of little chil- 
dren's understanding. You, with a mental content for 
mountain, can interpret instantly two slanting lines on 
the blackboard; but what will they mean to Beginners 
who have never seen mountains? Even if they live by 
them, they would never draw them so : and hardly till 
seven years old would they take two curved, parallel 
lines to mean a river. Better confine your drawings to 
include people, houses, horses and other familiar ani- 
mals, cars, perhaps boats, and, very rarely, flowers, and 
trees if you would escape the trap of unintelligible sym- 
bolic marks. 

Our choice of hymns and little prayers, too, should 
be equally careful. Many of the latter, intended for 
good-night use, dwell upon the thought of death and 
discourse about the soul ; or else the wording obviously 
reflects a sentimental adult's thoughts about children 
rather than expressing a normal child's thoughts and 
attitudes of praise, thanks, requests, or anything else. 

Ideas of right and wrong. — Children find which 
actions pay and which do not by the way other people 



What They Bring to Us 31 

i 

treat them. A fundamental law of learning is that we 
tend to repeat an act that brings satisfaction, and to re- 
frain from repeating one that brings unpleasant results. 
Thus, a child grabs for food, finds it tastes good, and is 
more likely to grab again. Another teases and whines 
for something he finally gets, and will repeat those suc- 
cessful tactics another time. In both cases the children 
form habits which pay them in tangible results. If the 
thing grabbed is hot or tastes unpleasant, if the whin- 
ing brings reprimand and never is rewarded by gaining 
the coveted object, then in both cases the actions which 
do not pay will be dropped. If saying "please" is re- 
warded by smiles and getting possession of the desired 
food, if using pleasant tones and courteous words bring 
social approval and probably compliance with the re- 
quest, then those habits will be formed, since they pay. 
The right, then, is that which works out well in ap- 
proval and other pleasant results ; the wrong is what 
works out badly, in disapproval and other unpleasant 
results. Conscience is not born, it is made. Watch a 
child look inquiringly at those around for signs for 
approval or not when he is in doubt over a new form of 
action. 

If a child is scolded for getting his clothes soiled, but 
laughed at admiringly when he is pert and rude, he will 
come to feel the first wrong and the second right. If a 
lie brings escape from feared consequences, if efforts 
to help mother are a sure way to her praise and reward, 
then both are learned as right. If eager questions meet 
sarcasm or impatience, if disobedience brings certain 
punishment, then both are learned as wrong. To know, 



32 A Study of the Little Child 

then, what a particular child's ideas of right and wrong 
are you must find out the kind of training he has had. 
A few words such as naughty, bad, nice, good, careful, 
brave will have helped clarify ideas as they are applied 
to conduct with a tone of voice showing which is com- 
mendable and which is not. 

Virtues that three- to four-year-olds may begin to 
appreciate are some control of crying, patience in wait- 
ing for things, cleanly control of the bodily functions, 
obedience, tidiness, some courtesy forms, kindliness, and 
courage. These are thought of in specific ways, such 
as minding mother, not spilling things, putting toys 
away, and so on. The older five-year-olds may be ex- 
pected to have added some control of impulses to han- 
dle things that are not theirs, some voluntary control 
of temper, more cleanliness, in general, "more" of the 
things mentioned above. Obedience is probably the 
paramount virtue, one of the sure foundations for all 
the self-control that is to come. 



Questions for Class Discussion 

1. What mistake did the teacher make who said to a 
Beginner, "Use the cylindrical blocks, not that one for 
the tower of the church you are building"? 

2. Change the following so that the average four- 
year-old could understand : 

"All through the day I humbly pray 
Be Thou my guard and guide." 

"We are little children, weak and apt to stray." 



What They Bring to Us 33 

"Lord, a little band and lowly 
We are come to sing to thee." 

'T want you to draw a figure just like that." 

3. Make a list of the words in The Lord's Prayer 
that are not in the vocabulary of the five-year-olds. 

What words would you use to explain them? What 
stories would you tell to give a concrete meaning to 
any one phrase? 

4. Explain why the children probably got the fol- 
lowing ideas in connection with The Lord's Prayer : 

(a) That we are telephoning to God. 

(b) That God doesn't like us to have cake or 
butter. 

(c) That God gives us our best dresses. 

(d) That we shouldn't go to the railway station. 

5. Criticize carefully the selection of hymns and 
songs for use in your Beginners Department. How 
far is the wording really suitable for children of four 
and five? How far does it represent adult sentiment 
only? Would you include the following, quoted in 
part, here? 

"Jesus loves me, loves me still, 
Tho' I'm very weak and ill. 
If I love him when I die 
He will take me home on high." 

"When he cometh ... to make up his jewels, 
. . . precious jewels, his loved and his own. 
Like the stars of the morning his bright crown adorn- 
ing, 
They shall shine in their beauty, bright gems for his 
crown." 

"I would be thy little lamb, Saviour dear." 



34 A Study of the Little Child 

6. [Quoted from Kirkpatrick, Fundamentals of 
Child Study J] A little girl who carefully covered a 
younger sister who had fallen asleep was, upon the re- 
turn of her parents, given ten cents by her father. The 
next time her parents went away she got her little sister 
to lie down and be covered. . . . Why ? 

7. What is the moral effect of offering candy as a 
reward for punctual attendance ? 



CHAPTER III 

WAYS THEY FEEL, AND WHAT THEY 
WANT TO DO 

Fore-Exercise 

1. Do you know of any little runaways? Do they 
always go to the same place? 

2. If there are one or two children about four with 
whom you can conveniently spend an hour, construct a 
little shelter where they can see it, by draping a rug over 
two chairs, or turning a packing case on its side, etc. 
Watch what they do. 

3. Recall any early experiences of your own when 
you were frightened. What caused it? Did you have 
any haunting fears as a child ? When and how did you 
outgrow them ? 

Physical activity. — "She is never still a minute." 
"He is into everything all the time." Such expressions 
show one marked characteristic of children of this age. 
It is literally true that they do not and cannot keep 
absolutely still, in the sense of being motionless, for 
more than a few seconds at a time. But, more than this, 
there is incessant movement comprising wrigglings, 
flinging the limbs 'about, squirming, twisting, even 
when sitting down. When not restricted in any way 
children do not remain seated, or in any position for 
long, but climb about, walk around, run, crouch, squat, 
move in all possible ways. Their bodies need this exer- 
cise in order to develop properly just as truly as they 
need food and air. The impulse to move is so strong 

35 



36 A Study of the Little Child 

that to be checked is unpleasant, not to say annoying; 
and the opportunity for greater freedom after a modi- 
fied restraint is always a welcome relief. 

Beyond these spontaneous, fidgety movements of the 
whole body are those made with objects. Large ones 
serve chiefly as pieces of gymnastic apparatus. Small 
ones are more like tools, clutched, pounded, shaken, 
rubbed, pulled, twisted, treated in every imaginable 
way. Little crevices seem to be fascinating too ; watch 
the way fingers have to be poked into little holes. By 
these activities children develop muscular control in 
handling things and in balancing the body, and start on 
the long road leading to physical skill. By them, also, 
the hands aid the learners to satisfy their curiosity with 
regard to things they see. During the investigating 
process children do not mind how much dirt they ac- 
quire ; but if the hands get into anything slimy or even 
very sticky, there is distress, and a tendency to wipe 
them off on anything handy, usually the clothing over 
the thighs. 

Interest in food. — Another strong desire at this 
age is for sweet, pleasant-tasting food. Earnest in- 
quiries about the kind of dessert that is coming, or 
emphatic announcement that they are going to have 
thus and so are very frequent. Many of the mothers' 
difficulties at this time arise from the children's dislike 
for some dishes they should eat and craving for others 
they see. Many are the little schemes children work 
out to get possession of the particular dainty they 
want. All sorts of devices may be seen — coaxing, teas- 
ing, crying, sulking, refusing to eat, grabbing others' 



Feeling and Desire to Do 37 

supplies, bolting their share to get more — the list is 
endless. Children often cram their mouths overly full 
of sweet things to get the biggest possible feeling, as 
it were. To fail to get a coveted article of food, or not 
to get a large portion of it, or a second helping of it is 
a big tragedy for a small person. 

Likes and dislikes for places. — If you followed the 
suggestion in- the second of the fore-exercises to this 
chapter, you probably found that your shelter was 
adopted, by the girls especially, as a little house. Any 
structure open on one side seems to have a great fas- 
cination for small folk, who will creep in and sit down 
with every evidence of enjoyment. This delight is 
changed to uneasiness if the opening is hidden when 
they are inside, and may speedily develop into a wild 
terror if the means of exit from the cramped space can- 
not be found. 

The desire to explore often shows at about three 
years old in wandering off to new scenes. It is partly 
their new-found independence, too, that makes them do 
this, partly the same instinct that leads birds to migrate, 
tramps to "hit the road," and perhaps ourselves to long 
to travel to new places for our vacation. The chief 
joy may lie in defying mother, running away from 
home, anywhere at all ; or it may lie in visiting some 
specially interesting place such as the bridge, the fire- 
engine house, the gate-tender's at the railway cross- 
ing, and other localities alarming from mother's point 
of view. This tendency may fade out by itself in a 
few months, to reappear some years later in a slightly 
different form. 



38 A Study of the Little Child 

Some strong dislikes. — Even a tiny baby shows 
fear of falling, and of sudden loud noises; and long 
before children are two years old they have probably 
come to be afraid of many other things. Fears of the 
dark, of noise, of thunderstorms, of the approach of 
strange animals, of strange people are very common, 
and we must be on the lookout to reassure children 
when such conditions of fear are likely to happen. The 
effect of a bad fright is about the same for the nervous 
system as an extensive burn is for the body ; it leaves 
a scar which will spoil the beauty of development, and 
is visible many years afterward, either as continued 
unreasoning fear, an aversion, or some form of eccen- 
tric behavior. Fortunately, it is possible with expert 
skill to educate people out of fears; but it is a long 
process, and it would be very much better to avoid oc- 
casions of great fright in these impressionable years. 

Another deep-rooted dislike is of having the bodily 
activity, described above as so constant, interfered with, 
however gently. Recall the frequent sight of a child 
being held when he wants to get down, how he will 
squirm and struggle, push, kick, hit out, and probably 
roar with anger though he is not being squeezed or hurt 
in any way, only prevented from moving as he wishes. 
Tf he is running and something gets in his way, or 
somebody else shoves against him, again there is re- 
sentment shown by pushing and hitting. If, when he 
is busy with his own concerns, some one seizes him, or 
shakes or slaps him, there is pretty sure to be some 
angry fighting aroused after the first shock of surprise. 
If, in his play, he hurts himself slightly against some 



Feeling and Desire to Do 39 

object, the probability is he will wreak vengeance on 
it, calling it names, striking or kicking it. If he is 
using some article and some one snatches it and makes 
off with it, the chances are he will object noisily, give 
chase to the offender and fight him if he is anywhere 
near the same size. In other words, it is not so much 
taunts that provoke rage at this period as concrete acts 
of interference with one's bodily self or one's recently 
acquired possessions. We do not lose these tenden- 
cies altogether ; witness a crowd at the bargain coun- 
ter, trying to get in and out of a narrow doorway — 
witness our own feelings toward the chair or stone that 
tripped us up. 

Social likes and dislikes. — A growing like, at 
about four years old, so different from a year or two 
earlier, is for the presence of other children. Harold, 
who lives alone, wants to go to see John down the road. 
Betty must take her doll to visit Jessie's. Susie wants 
a tea party with Freda and little brother Jim. Bob 
will wiggle under the fence to talk to Junior next door. 
They may not play well together — too many occasions 
arise for squabbling for that, but they do seek out each 
other's company. Harold wishes to show off his skill 
on the new tricycle; Betty must display her doll's new 
dress, and give it an airing in Jessie's baby carriage. 
Sue's mother will provide crackers and sugar-water for 
the feast ; Bob is transformed temporarily by his Indian 
suit. But John would also like to ride ; Jessie doesn't 
want to lend her baby carriage, and prefers digging in 
the sand to admiring the doll's dress. Freda drank all 
Jim's share, and Junior, alas, has no Indian suit. So 



40 A Study of the Little Child 

heart-burnings arise, and some one comes home crying 
with a grievance before long. 

Notice, though, how responsible Susie looks as she 
helps little brother down the steps, also how she loves 
to "boss" him about. John, too, may be quite sym- 
pathetic when Harold gets a nasty tumble. Betty will 
sit and croon her doll baby to sleep, and tenderly cover 
that same baby for the night before she can go to bed 
herself. Junior's horse must be carefully stabled. 
Along with the less desirable forms of self-display and 
jealousy are also these affectionate, motherly tendencies 
to care for others. 

How to treat these instincts. — Our problem is, 
how shall the good tendencies be perpetuated, and those 
not so good be made to disappear? The usual way in 
the home is to show approval or otherwise reward a 
child who acts in a desirable way, and by showing dis- 
approval, disappointment, sorrow, anger, or by punish- 
ing the child when his actions are undesirable. On the 
whole, this is a fundamentally good method, since 
everyone tends to repeat acts that result in pleasure, and 
to refrain from acts that bring discomfort. 

There are other ways of training, though. One is to 
provide a great many things which will be natural 
stimuli for the behavior we want, or to see that the 
child often meets the same stimulus. Thus, we find 
other children for an only child to play with ; we have 
a load of sand delivered to the play yard ; we awaken 
interest by bright pictures, rhythmic games ; we stimu- 
late imagination by telling stories. The converse of 
this method, spoken of above in the case of fears, is 



Feeling and Desire to Do 41 

to prevent those things happening, if we can, which are 
likely to bring the undesired behavior. The mother 
who does not get her child's attention when she speaks, 
but impatiently catches hold of him and shakes him, has 
only herself to thank if he acts like a little wildcat at 
the time, and later shows an irritable disposition. 

Still another way is to show a child a better way of act- 
ing than the way he is taking, and then see that he gets 
plenty of opportunity to practice the new way, and is 
commended when he substitutes the preferred behavior 
for the old. Thus, cramming the mouth so full must 
give way to more polite manners ; and the rough hand- 
ling that broke the toy or hurt the puppy must be 
replaced by quieter movements. Further, we teach 
children to be afraid, not of the loud noise, but of run- 
ning in front of the automobile that is making it. Fear, 
not of the dark, but of doing those things that will not 
bear the light of our fellows' knowledge, is what we 
aim for. 

Questions for Discussion 

1. How could training in control of the appetite for 
foodstuffs be made of moral value ? 

2. Give some suggestions for dealing with a ten- 
dency to be cruel. 

3. Of the three methods, disuse, substitution, pun- 
ishment, which is best in the long run ? Why ? 

4. Give illustrations of adults carelessly fostering 
undesirable instincts in little children by their own be- 
havior. 

5. How much opportunity for physical activity is 
arranged for during the Sunday-school session in your 
Beginners Department ? 



CHAPTER IV 

RESPONSE TO NEW ATMOSPHERE AND 
RELATIONSHIPS 

Fore-Exercise 

1. In what sort of circumstances have you ever been 
bashful? What helped you feel at ease? 

2. What is your natural reaction when your long- 
cherished plan is thwarted by others? What have you 
learned to do on such occasions ? How did you learn it ? 

3. What is your natural impulse when some one in- 
terferes with you physically by getting in the way or 
removing something for which you were reaching? 
How did you learn to control that impulse? 

Feeling. — The first day in the department ! Can 
you remember how your very first day at school felt? 
Everything so strange and unfamiliar, none of your own 
family around to turn to for reassurance, and so many, 
many people. For many little children the whole ex- 
perience is so bewildering that they are awed into a 
species of paralysis. They will sit mute, unable to 
make any response to well-meant advances, watching 
the others but declining to share in any activity. It is 
wise not to try to force such shy ones to speak or take 
part. That has about the same effect inside the child 
as the gradually increasing horror of a nightmare has 
for us, till it feels as though something must give way. 
Picture it. A buzzing confusion of unaccustomed 
sights and sounds out of which nothing comes very in- 

42 



New Atmosphere and Relationships 43 

telligibly — but the child finds himself on a little chair 
perhaps. To that he seems anchored ; leave it he 
daren't and can't till mother appears again. Leave 
such a child alone, be busy near him doing something 
he will be interested in, tell a story to the group includ- 
ing him, and gradually the frozen numbness will thaw 
and he will begin to respond. 

Another kind of shy child who is more assertive may 
cry dismally and refuse to be left alone by mother or 
older sister. Singing may help these little folk, or some 
petting and cuddling ; but the safest way is to have en- 
ticing things to be done by them which you or some of 
the others are already doing. If you are thus busy and 
suddenly need a little assistance, many is the disconso- 
late person who will be drawn into self-forgetful activ- 
ity. The Sunday school may not compare with the day- 
school kindergarten in possessing such features as a big 
slide, live animals, dolls, simple gymnastic apparatus to 
help distract attention from personal woes to outside 
interests ; but what equipment there is should be as at- 
tractively displayed as possible. 

Besides the shy children there are the restless, inquisi- 
tive ones who want immediately to touch and investi- 
gate everything new that they see. Then there are 
those who are overanxious to make some kind of dis- 
play, and who are delighted if there is a "welcome" 
ceremony for their special benefit. There are the little 
chatter-boxes used to talking almost all the time, who 
cannot understand the requirement of being quiet while 
others talk. There are others coming from homes 
where they have been the only child, and who cannot 



44 A Study of the Little Child 

understand why they are not the center of attention now 
as heretofore. Almost none of them have been called 
on to do things with a group of others like themselves, 
and they are not used to actions involving everybody at 
the same time. However, as in adjusting themselves to 
their family's demands, they have found that mother's 
arrangements sometimes interfere with their doing 
what they want just when they want, there is the basis 
for the new kind of behavior they will have to learn. 

Absorption through the senses. — Shy ones and 
self-assertive ones alike are all very busy taking things 
in. Even for the bewildered ones some things stand 
out sharply, and as the confused feeling subsides some 
one or two objects in the new surroundings will attract 
interested attention. It may be the clothes the next lit- 
tle girl is wearing, it may be the chair she is sitting on, 
or the picture they are given to hold, or the face of the 
teacher at which newcomers will gaze admiringly. A 
school with a separate room for the Beginners, and 
equipment including a piano, small tables, building- 
blocks, pictures, crayons, a sand table, and the like will 
offer much of immediate interest. With little urging 
the gazing turns into touching and doing things. The 
small building serving for church and school both, with 
but one corner curtained off for the weest ones, offers 
less, of course, for their immediate delight. Here it 
is more than ever necessary that the teacher should 
know how to appeal to the eyes, ears, and fingers of her 
group. 

Hands are a most important agency in helping chil- 
dren of his age to learn. Merely to see an object at a 



New Atmosphere and Relationships 45 

distance does not mean very much to three- and four- 
year-olds. They need to get hold of it, feel it, pass 
their hands over it, turn it about if it is small, clamber 
over it if it is big. In a sense their hands are another 
pair of eyes to them. Just as we, when our eyes do not 
see very well or when we are not sure of what they tell 
us, help ourselves out by touching things, so little chil- 
dren need to do this the greater part of the time. In 
this way they get to understand differences in texture, 
size, contour, temperature, flexibility, and scores of sim- 
ilar attributes of objects. 

Gestures which they see may be minutely copied. 
Many a child who sits apparently absorbed in listening 
to some one's talk is in reality watching him, and will, 
later on, mimic characteristic movements with startling 
fidelity. Sounds, which cannot be touched to be under- 
stood, must also be copied. Sometimes children seem 
to be almost little echoes of what they hear, giving back 
intonations, the last word or two of a question instead 
of answering it, also noises made by animals, whistles, 
automobiles, machinery, and so forth. Particularly are 
new sights, movements, and sounds of interest, needing 
a period of lengthy investigation, a sort of watchful 
waiting with reproduction at intervals till the children 
are well acquainted with them and play with them as 
familiars. This is their way of reflection, not thinking 
over things so much as, literally, mirroring what they 
find around them. 

Response to new authority. — One of the new 
things to be examined, watched, listened to, and "re- 
flected" is the teacher. The child apparently unrespon- 



46 A Study of the Little Child 

sive at first to what the teacher is saying may be so 
struck with the novelty of her appearance, gait, ges- 
tures, facial expression that he cannot yet attend 
through his ears. He actually does not hear. Patience, 
and slow, gentle, but insistent repetition will win 
through to his consciousness, however, and give you ac- 
cess to his mind in another way. 

Most children once so reached are quite ready to do 
as the teacher asks them, even the timid ones when the 
first strange feeling has worn off. Little children be- 
lieve and act upon what they are told, being very sug- 
gestible and answering rapidly to the emotional tone. 
Irritation will breed nervousness, joyfulness will pro- 
pagate itself. Anxiety, hope, fear, friendliness, impa- 
tient hurrying, calm control — all these are quickly felt 
and spread the so-called atmosphere of the class- 
room. 

Some few children may be in the stage we call 
contra-suggestible, when the fact of having one action 
suggested seems to make them want to refuse to do it 
or to choose the exact opposite if possible. This is a 
phase many children go through, lasting for a few 
weeks or several months. It really is one way of dis- 
covering their own personality, of achieving a greater 
independence, an intoxicating realization that they can 
oppose their wills to the wills of others. They try out 
their degree of social independence somewhere about 
three or four years old just as their bodies tried out 
physical independence during the second year of life 
by meeting and overcoming obstacles. Wisely handled, 
they may quickly learn to overcome the difficulties of 



New Atmosphere and Relationships 47 

their own less desirable impulses and gain a stronger 
character thereby. Poorly handled, they experience 
nothing but a series of collisions with adults in which 
they either get away successfully with their own 
defiance or are outraged by some punishment at the 
hands of exasperated authority. 

Undoubtedly, a child in this stage is not easy to deal 
with when first he becomes a member of the Beginners 
Department. Try to avoid issuing a command which 
risks a flat refusal. If your invitation or suggestion is 
frankly declined, leave the child alone sooner than 
wheedle or coax him ; but see that he gets no pleasure 
whatever from his abstaining, rather that he comes to 
feel left out of things and ignored, till he feels ready 
and willing to comply. Then praise him for his at last 
being able to do as he was asked, make it worth while 
to him in ways he can enjoy so that on the next occa- 
sion he is likely to conquer himself more quickly. Of 
course you will be careful that neither directions nor 
requests are in the form, "Don't do" thus and so; for 
that simply presents an idea of an undesired act to the 
children, leading them to think about it and tend to 
do it. 

Some adults, unused to children of this age, adopt an 
artificial way of talking down to them which brings un- 
satisfactory results. Though it is true, as was empha- 
sized earlier, that the words used must be simple and 
within the range of their understanding, there is no need 
for baby talk nor for skittish playfulness, nor for the 
sentimental patronizing air which some people assume. 
What might succeed with a ten-months'-old infant is 



48 A Study of the Little Child 

an insult to the intelligence of a child of four. Though 
he cannot tell what is wrong he instinctively feels the 
sham of the assumption, and shows his resentment by 
sturdy ungraciousness. More constant companionship 
with little children will help cure an adult of this mis- 
take and bring a genuine attitude of respect for their 
individuality. But once the confidence of a child is 
lost, it is difficult to regain it. By a complete cessation 
of artificiality and a serious way of going about the 
business for the day the mistrusted adult may be re- 
stored to favor. 

Response to the rights of others. — The chief diffi- 
culty for four-year-olds in the new environment is get- 
ting used to so many other children. At home there 
are only a few people and perhaps more adults than 
children. If there are no others near their own age, 
they have probably been used to a good deal of care 
and attention. Johnny has his own crib, his chair, the 
place where his clothes are kept, his own place at table, 
his particular books and toys. This new world is 
densely populated with children and a few grown-ups 
who allow him no special rights. There are many 
chairs, many hooks for clothing, pictures, and some 
other things in common. At home when Margaret 
chatters or shows off, or plays make-believe, there are 
few to interfere and one or two to appreciate. Here 
everybody else wants to make a display too. The "see 
me do it" does not always find any spectators ; indeed, 
the call seems to be rather to take a passive role. Har- 
old's make-believe does not fit in with Molly's. When 
Billy wants to do one thing Warren wants something 



New Atmosphere and Relationships 49 

different, and Eleanor wants the same thing to use at 
the same time, and is likely to snatch it from Billy. Is 
it any wonder there are clashes when there are so many 
different personalities, each with desires, imagination, 
curiosity, none used to being together, much less work- 
ing together ? 

This problem of cooperation represents, after all, the 
highest social achievement. Toward its solution hu- 
manity is laboriously striving in its families, cities, 
nations, with so many mistakes in the course of its 
efforts. To learn where individual rights are justly 
limited by the needs of a larger society requires long 
experimenting. Here are these young members of the 
race beginning some of these very experiments. They 
must learn that when two want the same object at the 
same time one must give way, or else some compromise 
plan be found. They must" realize that all cannot se- 
cure public attention equally, nor all the time, nor all at 
the same time. They must find out that their fellows 
may look coldly on schemes which -are of delightful 
warmth to them. They must sometimes take part in 
working out the idea another originated even when 
they do not like it at first. They must discover that 
hitting out at others is likely to result in being hurt 
oneself. 

Disappointments, temper, jealousies, resentments — all 
these are likely to play their part in this learning 
process as the little individualists become more adjusted 
to group relations. To show these feelings is not a 
proof of inherent wickedness, but simply an instinctive 
reaction of the developing self. Naturally, Owen's 



50 A Study of the Little Child 

wants and interests are more important to him than are 
those of anyone else. Without this self-seeking, this 
reaching out, wanting, and taking in everything possi- 
ble it is difficult to see how a big self could be made. 
Even a plant has to grow by the same method. In the 
end, the bigger self there is the richer he will be for 
society's use of him. The church needs big men and 
women, strong and active for its work, not empty, 
flabby weaklings who do not understand how to fight 
for the right. 

Other types of emotions — sympathy, pity, the gener- 
osity that wants to share — are there, too, but are rela- 
tively less developed. It is these which the teacher will 
emphasize and the happiness that comes from playing 
together, taking turns so that all get a chance, the mul- 
tiplied joy from singing or listening together to a story. 
Helping, giving, and sharing are interesting as well as 
getting. To have it brought home to them what others 
want, and to find a way of satisfying those wants with- 
out altogether neglecting their own is a growth into 
wisdom and moral stature we want our children to 
attain. 

Questions for Discussion 

1. What sort of objects have you for little children 
to handle that will have a teaching value for the things 
you want them to learn in Sunday school? 

2. What is the special danger of a drawling, whin- 
ing, nasal, or harsh intonation on the part of the 
teacher ? 

3. Give illustrations of adults who do not "get on'' 
with children. Try to analyze the reason for it. 

4. Two children have seized the same object and 



New Atmosphere and Relationships 51 

are fighting for possession of it. What would vou do 
-separate them? Let them fight it out? Take away 
the thing from both ? Give it to one ? Give each one ? 
Express surprise at their behavior? Reprove them? 
Or what? Why? 



CHAPTER V 

CHANGING PHYSICAL POWERS 
Fore-Exercise 

1. Measure the height from the floor to the door 
handles in your home, to the pew seats in the church. 

2. Take a book with fine print. Select a page that 
is not much broken into paragraphs. With your left 
hand draw pencil lines as quickly as you can between 
the rows trying not to touch the print. How do you 
feel emotionally at the end of the task ? 

3. Try to tie two ends of string in an ordinary bow- 
knot without using either thumb or index finger. 

4. Watch a child of four throwing a ball. How 
does he use his arms ? 

Limitations. — Of course we know that four-year- 
olds are short ; but we probably have forgotten how it 
feels to move about among things that were built for 
people nearly half again as tall as ourselves. The aver- 
age four-year-old is only 38 inches in height, the five- 
year-old 40 or 41, less than two thirds the stature of 
the average woman. Of this total height a larger 
proportion of it is trunk, and a smaller proportion 
of it legs than is the case with adults. If a grown-up 
person's trunk were relatively as long and his legs as 
short as the four-year-old's, he would look a squat, mis- 
shapen monstrosity. Yet these small legs have to climb 
upstairs, step off curbstones, dangle from seats made 
for people of entirely different size, not to mention 

52 



Changing Physical Powers 53 

work at top speed to keep up the travel pace when go- 
ing for a walk with daddy. Imagine yourself living 
in a world of Brobdingnagian furniture, the seats of all 
the chairs higher than the ordinary office stool, the 
table-top on the level of your nose, the door handles 
above your head, and you may appreciate the difficul- 
ties three-year-olds encounter. Better still, sit on the 
floor awhile and see how unattainable some objects ap- 
pear. Add to this the fact that for small arms not only 
are things large but also solid and unwieldly. Children 
must deal with weights relatively as heavy for them as 
are the overfilled suitcases you so gladly relinquish to 
the porter. 

As a matter of fact, the internal organs develop 
more rapidly than do the muscles until four years old ; 
and the years from four to six, when there is such con- 
stant motion as we have seen, are a preparation stage 
for the more rapid development of the muscular system 
which takes place from five or six to nine. Although 
children are more "sensory" and less "motor" now than 
in the next three years, and more content than their 
older brothers and sisters to play quiet games, they live 
out what they learn through the senses in some motor 
expression. We have emphasized how the hand move- 
ments clarify the ideas gained through the eyes ; and 
we shall see later how in the larger movements of dra- 
matic play children "learn" the actions and character- 
istics of people around them. To prevent children's 
perfect freedom of movement in these early years, then, 
is to run the risk of stunting them both physically and 
mentally. 



54 A Study of the Little Child 

Degree of dexterity. — Investigation shows us that 
those muscles develop power and skill first which origi- 
nated first in embryonic life. Roughly, that means the 
larger muscles lying nearer the central nervous system, 
for instance, shoulder muscles before upper arm, and 
these again before lower arm, wrist, and fingers. 

Three-year-olds' adjustments are coarse and crude, 
the bigger muscles move clumsily and rapidly, accom- 
plishing a movement by a sort of hit-or-miss method. 
In an attempt at a delicate task they tend to put too 
much force into their efforts to succeed, so that tum- 
bles for themselves, breakages and scratches of the ob- 
jects are likely to ensue. Tasks requiring fine 
coordination should not be given to children under five ; 
to do so will tend to produce a nervous condition. They 
cannot, for instance, profitably do the interlacing of 
slats and fine weaving that used to figure in our kinder- 
garten occupations. More modern schools provide 
larger, but easily handled, light-weight objects for chil- 
dren to manipulate. They cannot tap fast with their 
fingers, nor tie two ends of string, nor without great 
difficulty thread a large needle. Even an effort to keep 
still brings symptoms of nervous irritation, and their 
movements are only partly suppressed. 

Between three and six there is a decided gain in 
steadiness of control ; but even so, the fingers are less 
well controlled than are the arms as a whole. It is in- 
teresting to note that girls show superior ability to 
boys in this. In general bodily control of complex 
coordination a six-year-old may have acquired about 
half the ability he ever will, but in control of the fingers 



Changing Physical Powers 55 

he has less than one fifth the skill that adults have. 

In strength, too, there is gain during this period, 
till at six boys have about one fifth of the strength of 
average sixteen-year-olds as measured by the grip of 
the hands. Here again girls have made a greater rela- 
tive gain by six; though, as a woman's strength is so 
much less than a man's, this statement only means that 
girls at six have a greater proportion of the strength 
they will ultimately attain than boys have, not that their 
hands are stronger than boys' hands. 

In the skill necessary for learning to sing, most four- 
year-olds can keep time to a simple two-beat measure. 
More than half the girls can sing the major scale in 
tune in imitation of somebody, and by five years old 
nearly three quarters of them can. The boys are not 
so good at this, it has been found. In remembering 
songs, singing them unaided from memory, the girls 
are again better than the boys, though the boys do this 
more successfully than reproducing the scale in tune. 

Muscles, nerves, and eyes. — The body does not 
grow at a uniform rate ; there are years of rapid, and 
years of slower growth. Some months, those of fall 
and winter, there is greater gain in weight, while in the 
spring and early summer there is more increase in 
height. Three-year-olds, although over half the height 
they will eventually be, are only one sixth to one fourth 
their adult weight. They average thirty pounds, less 
than one pound for every inch of height. In three years 
they add approximately fifteen pounds in weight and 
eight inches in height, on the whole a greater gain rela- 
tively in weight. 



56 A Study of the Little Child 

Besides this gross difference every organ and every 
group of muscles seems to have its own rate of growth. 
More than that, each part also has its own rhythm of 
growth, increasing rapidly for awhile, then making but 
a slight gain while it is the turn of some other part to 
make a spurt. Thus, though the liver is comparatively 
large in infancy, it is much less in relative weight at five 
years old, partly because that is a period of slow growth 
for this organ, partly because it coincides with a time of 
more rapid growth for other parts. Until four years 
old the muscles of the thighs are increasing in girth 
quickly, after four comes the turn of the muscles in the 
calf of the leg. Similarly, the upper arm had its greater 
development before the lower arm. All through the 
period we are discussing, the arms have much less 
growth and development than do the legs. An infant's 
head is large for its body and as wide as the shoulders ; 
but after three the bones of the shoulder girdle grow 
rapidly, and the shoulders stand out from the trunk. 

We may mark three stages in the development of 
any part. First, rapid growth in the sense of enlarge- 
ment, a preparation for the later stages, a sort of vege- 
tative condition mostly taking in nourishment. In the 
second stage the part needs exercise to strengthen and 
increase its growth. In the third stage the part is 
nearly mature, and soon will grow no more. It can 
now endure more strain of hard work without injury. 
In the baby under eight months the leg muscles are in 
the first stage. Crawling and walking mark the begin- 
ning of the second stage which is continuing in the 
years we are interested in. The incessant trotting 



Changing Physical Powers 57 

about provides the very necessary exercise needed for 
vigorous growth. The muscles crave exercise, and a 
large amount of it — but in short periods only, and at 
frequent intervals. A child of four or five may easily 
cover ten miles in the course of his running about dur- 
ing the day ; but we could not take such a child on an 
unbroken ten-mile walk without serious fatigue and 
probable injury. In their spontaneous play you will 
notice that the heavy muscles of the legs are used more 
than those of the arms, agreeing with what was said 
above as to the earlier development of the lower limbs. 
The arms, too, tend to move as a whole from the shoul- 
der in movements such as waving, pounding, pushing, 
showing how the fore-arm is less well advanced than 
the upper arm, and, as was stated before, how the mus- 
cles called "fundamental" are better controlled earlier 
than those called "accessory." The finger muscles have 
not yet acquired much independence, and are not at all 
ready to execute complicated movements. 

The brain follows the same laws of variation in 
growth. Most of its weight is gained before birth ; by 
three years old it has gained about seven ninths of its 
adult weight and about nine tenths at six years old. Its 
period of mere growth then is slackening, but the exer- 
cise of it is very important. The simpler parts of the 
brain develop, first. Those parts which have to do with 
receiving sensations mature before those which help 
control movements. If in this exercise stage of growth 
of the sensation brain centers children do not get 
enough sense training, they may be permanently under- 
developed in this respect just as the body as a whole 



58 A Study of the Little Child 

may be stunted for lack of exercise and nourishment at 
the right time. Those parts of the brain which have to 
do with the highest type of thinking grow more slowly 
and mature much later than any other part. We can- 
not expect complicated reasoning out of problems by 
little children, not only because their experience is so 
limited, but also because their nervous systems are not 
matured sufficiently to permit controlled brain action of 
the kind required for that sort of thinking. 

Both muscles and nerves need rest periods alternat- 
ing with exercise periods. The best kind of rest is, of 
course, in sleep. Three-year-olds are still in need of a 
daytime nap ; and four-year-olds would be the better 
for it too. Their night sleep should be twelve hours, 
if possible, eleven for the five-year-old. During the 
day quieter occupations should follow periods of active 
exercise physically. After periods of active attention- 
giving should be opportunity for more relaxed spon- 
taneous attention to something different. Children vary 
a good deal more. Ten minutes may be all one child 
can enjoy without change ; another, busy with some fas- 
cinating project of his own, may put in an hour and a 
half quite comfortably. 

The eyes at this period are well along in the exercise 
stage of growth, but they are not ready to stand much 
strain. Even if five-year-olds can read we should not 
let them do it for long, nor can they use fine print with 
any safety. 

This is the smallest size print we 
should present to them. 



Changing Physical Powers 59 

The act of reading involves a great many fine, com- 
plicated eye movements apart from the strain of focus- 
ing on something rather close to the eyes for long. 

To sum up, then, there is a natural, physical basis 
for the eagerness to look at, listen to, taste,, touch, and 
handle things. There is a law of growth behind the 
fact that children want to move about frequently, that 
they fidget if asked to keep still. Forced, monotonous, 
or prolonged movement will soon tire them ; what they 
need is many exercise periods but varied, and inter- 
spersed with other occupations. They need plenty of 
sleep. We must not expect skill or delicacy of control 
in the smaller muscles either of eyes or hands. 

Questions for Discussion 

1. What would you suggest as comfortable seats for 
Beginners if they have to meet in the auditorium of the 
church ? 

2. Give some reasons why children of this age need 
help with their clothing, in opening cupboards and 
drawers? Why do they so often tear their picture 
books ? 

3. Is jumping the rope a frequent favorite game of 
four-year-olds? Why, or why not? 

4. Would having a "rest period" of five minutes 
during the Sunday-school session be a desirable thing 
for the Beginners' Department? Why, or why not? 

5. What sort of use of crayons is within the power 
of three- and four-year-old children? Does your les- 
son system demand too much from them in this ? 

6. How many hours of sleep does each child in the 
department get ? 



CHAPTER VI 

NEED OF MENTAL SATISFACTION 

Fore-Exercise 

1. During two separate hours spent with a child of 
four, write down every question asked. Later, group 
them into questions about objects, about actions seen, 
about purposes of actions, about causes of natural phe- 
nomena, about mechanics, about number. 

2. Can you recall any curious erroneous ideas you 
had at an early age? Can you trace how they origi- 
nated ? 

Gaining new ideas. — "The world is so full of a 
number of things" for little folk, who are veritablyhun- 
gry to find out about these same things. One im- 
portant method they use is, as we have seen, by touch- 
ing what they see, getting as much sense impression as 
possible, and enjoying as many forms of it as allowed. 
Another method is by copying the actions seen and the 
sounds heard, finding out what it feels like to do things 
themselves. Another method is by asking older people 
the words for the names of things and their attributes. 

What is it they so constantly say from three years 
old on? "What is that? What are they doing? 
Why? What is that for? Why? How do you do 
that? Why? Who did that?" They are veritable 
animated interrogation points, exhausting the informa- 
tion of the most erudite adult, whose patience, alas, fre- 

60 



Need of Mental Satisfaction 61 

quently gives out, too, when the children are bidden to 
''stop asking questions !" Such an attitude, or one that 
deliberately gives foolish or false replies makes an enor- 
mous stumblingblock in the path these little ones fol- 
low to life and knowledge. If the years preceding 
three are all-important for the healthy unfolding of the 
emotional nature, these years before six are the crucial 
ones for formulating the outlines of a crude system of 
philosophy which may shape their thinking for years 
to come. 

This avid curiosity is directed first to the sensory 
qualities of things around. Hence the first hand, per- 
sistent investigating. As the objects become familiar 
the attention is turned to parts specially interesting, or 
to similarities. Children should be encouraged in this 
sort of discrimination, for out of it grows the scientific 
method. Interested Frances remarks of the words 
butter and brother written in large script that "they 
both have the same little pipe at one end" (the letter 
b). Sharp-eyed Ruth notices that the frill on auntie's 
underskirt is made of the same goods as the waist she 
wore yesterday. This relating of experiences marks an 
important step in the development of intelligence. 
Either by the presence of new things in the surround- 
ings, or by the discovery of new relationships among 
old ones all knowledge is advanced. 

To get clear ideas, however, requires that the learn- 
ers have expression in language for what they see. 
Thus, most of their first questions are "What is that?" 
By this means they acquire their stock of nouns, which 
we saw was relatively so large. "What are they do- 



62 A Study of the Little Child 

ing?" gives them their verbs. "What is that for? 
Who made that? Why?" so frequent in the fourth 
year evidences the search after the causal relation, hid- 
den connections, origins of things, explanations of nat- 
ural phenomena. Children will attack any problem, 
propounding queries that have puzzled our wisest 
philosophers. "What makes the fire burn? W 7 here 
does the wind go? How far is it to the sky? What 
is my chin for? Why does pussy have fur? Who 
made God? Why do people have to have mothers? 
Why doesn't my hand make a hole in the water?" are 
samples of eager questions. With the knowledge of 
adjectival words children inquire about their limitations 
thus: "What is the hardest thing in the world? Are 
things that run like water wet?" In verifying their 
knowledge they tend to make statements with a query 
at the end, thus : "Warm can melt cold things, can't it? 
Nobody can do that, can they ? That's a blue one, isn't 
it?" This need for reassurance at every step mentally 
is analogous to the baby's grasping at helping hands 
when he begins to walk. 

Sometime before six comes the interest in counting, 
in learning the number names and saying them over. 
Not at first is the comprehension of what five is, or that 
one less than five is four, but there is a delight in re- 
peating the syllables as such, partly, perhaps, on ac- 
count of the rhythm involved. During the years from 
four to six there is a tremendous growth of interest in 
number, shown not only in counting up to hundreds, 
but in measuring objects, in questions about cost, eager- 
ness for little problems involving number. "How long 



Need of Mental Satisfaction 63 

is six feet? Is a thousand dollars a lot"? Did the sol- 
diers have hundreds of guns with them?" 

Enjoying old impressions. — Along- with this quest 
for a new experience and for the words in which to talk 
about them is the deep satisfaction of returning again 
and again to familiar objects, stories, places, people. 
The old picture book is pored over till its loosened and 
dog-eared pages bear witness to their frequent use. 
Judith likes her new doll, but the real heart's treasure 
is that battered, decrepit object, loved so hard that its 
first beauty has long since departed. After the com- 
parative strain of listening to a new s,tory, notice the 
lighting up of the faces, and the sigh of satisfaction as a 
well-known tale is begun. 

Maybe we give our four-year-olds new stories too 
often, in the Sunday school. Why forty different ones 
for forty Sundays ? Why even thirty ? Why not twenty 
or fewer, but these told over and over till they are thor- 
oughly known? Remember, the smallest Beginners 
cannot appreciate complex or long stories, and that their 
attention easily shifts. With vivid tales, full of action, 
told in simple language, we shall not confuse them by 
having a short one and a longer one in one day's ses- 
sion. In the second year in the department one third 
to one half the stories may profitably be old ones, with 
plenty of opportunity for repeating the new ones. As 
has been pointed out before, the very same wording of 
the tales is expected by the audience. To them the 
words are the story very largely ; and the complaint, 
"You're telling it all different," voices their resentment 
at the disguise of an old favorite. After a good deal 



64 A Study of the Little Child 

of retelling, the fourth or even the seventh repetition, 
there will be some among the four-year-olds who are 
ready to help tell parts of the story — either the high 
spots, or to say over any little recurrent phrases of the 
"I'll huff and I'll puff and I'll blow your house in" 
order. By and by they may want to play the story. 
Here we must be careful to avoid forcing our adult 
ideas, drawn from studying the drama and visiting the 
theater, upon their spontaneity. They want to inter- 
pret the story more fully to themselves, not to impress 
spectators — to enjoy the emotions aroused by going 
through the actions, not to present to someone else an 
aesthetic, unitary whole. 

Another way in which liking for the habitual may 
show is in their happiness with a fairly fixed order of 
doing things, a certain song to be sung just now, a regu- 
lar way to march round the room, perhaps. Whatever 
little routine or ritual you introduce comes to be felt 
as the Thing to Do. The same feeling accounts in part 
for the fondness of visiting places time after time, also 
for the species of home-sickness that attacks little visit- 
ors not yet adjusted to new surroundings. People, 
also, are hailed as accepted phenomena in Things as 
They Are. The lady-in-the-house-with-flowers, My- 
policeman-on-the-corner, Mr.-Robinson-next-door are 
fixtures in the four-year-old's world. What wonder 
that it takes time to get used to the new teacher, so 
many new children, a new room, new things to do, when 
all are introduced at once. 

Comparing new with old. — Every new thing 
learned becomes in its turn a possible means of acquir- 



Need of Mental Satisfaction 65 

ing something fresh. What children take in does not 
rest a passive, inactive part of them ; rather is it so di- 
gested that it forms part of a living mental stuff which 
reaches out and gathers in still newer material. This 
new presentation, if an object, is attended to because 
it is at the same time like something they know and yet 
different. Harry sees Randolph's bed, which is not 
like either his own or his daddy's, though all have 
sheets and pillows and are used to sleep in. Harry has 
a better idea of what a bed is by seeing these different 
sorts than he would have had if all had been alike. 
Watch children comparing toys, clothing with each 
other. Listen to what they say, apparently bragging 
about what they have or do "at my house." It is sim- 
ply using the natural basis for a comparison. If the 
new presentation is in language alone, it must be 
brought into line with ideas already in use. Hence the 
questions which help interpret the new in the light of 
the familiar. If there is no one to explain hard matters 
to children, they will invent an explanation for them- 
selves. Five-year-old George answered a younger sis- 
ter's query, "What makes it snow ?" by "It's God doing 
this," pantomiming the act of scattering. 

Since what is known is the only basis by which to 
apprehend the unknown, it follows that proper under- 
standing of new ideas is conditioned by what chances to 
be known, also by what is thought of at the time, some- 
times even by what happens to be before the eyes at the 
time. Very often, then, peculiar interpretations are 
made, since the previous knowledge is so limited. 
Frank, who heard the church called God's house, looked 



66 A Study of the Little Child 

for the bedrooms and dining-room which he felt ought 
to be there; small May, inquiring what a teetotaler 
was, hearing something in the reply about using water 
and chancing to look at the big water pipes of the heat- 
ing system meanwhile, supposed for years that a tee- 
totaller was a person who used big pipes like those in 
her house. Dorothy, from a vague jumble of texts 
heard, visualized God, with Jesus beside him, sitting in 
the back pew of their church, his feet propped on a 
high hassock of earth. Little Sarah, from a home 
where drunken brutality made life a fearsome thing, did 
not find the thought of a heavenly Father a helpful one. 

The similar sounds of words will often mislead chil- 
dren. On investigation, many thought that butterflies 
made butter, bees gave beans, ants and aunts were 
somehow connected, with other weird analogies. 

These analogies and interpretations may burst forth 
in children's minds at what seem to the teacher inoppor- 
tune moments. Or, if the teacher cannot see for her- 
self the cause of the analogy she may regard the re- 
marks as wholly irrelevant interruptions. For instance, 
Denny was reminded by the gesturing of the teacher's 
hands as she described the flight of a dragon fly of the 
way the elephant he had seen waved his trunk, and 
promptly contributed an observation anent the length 
of elephants' "noses." Many teachers would be not a 
little disconcerted by this sudden transition from 
dragon flies to elephants, and either have ignored Denny 
or reproved him for this long-distance connection, miss- 
ing the eye-compelling short circuit effected by her ges- 
ticulations. Wisely, this teacher capped his remark 



Need of Mental Satisfaction 67 

with one of her own, also about elephants' noses, when, 
after a pause, Denny demanded a continuation of the 
story. When you are confronted with apparently ex- 
traneous matter introduced, do not "shut the child up" 
incontinently, but try to find the connecting link, if pos- 
sible. In any case, be sympathetic- with the point of 
view ; work always to find that which is known, and re- 
late the new to it by easy and striking comparisons. 

We see from this that children cannot appreciate the 
absolutely new — they simply ignore it, since they have 
nothing within by which to reach it. It is only by slow 
steps that knowledge is acquired, we cannot expect 
them to progress by airplane leaps. The relationship 
between known 'and unknown is the bridge by which 
they pass, and it is the teachers' work to see that the 
connections are true and firm. 

Of what use is it to present abstract truths in sym- 
bolic form, when the objects used as symbols, let alone 
the truth they are to convey, are unfamiliar ? How can 
little children realize adult motives and aspirations, 
adult emotions and concepts as expressed in our pray- 
ers, our hymns, or some Biblical passages which they 
hear? Let us give them mental food suitable to their 
stage of development, capable of being properly as- 
similated. 

Questions for Discussion 

1. What elements of repetition make the story of 
the calling of little Samuel a favorite ? 

2. Get samples of lesson courses for Beginners from 
four or five different published lesson systems. Com- 
pare them for: 



68 A Study of the Little Child 

(a) Number of stories included for a year's course. 

(b) Identity of stories selected. 

(c) Little prayers, if any, to be taught. 

(d) Number of hymns or song texts to be taught in 
a year. 

{c) Hymns with refrains or choruses. 

3. Would Beginners understand the 23d Psalm by 
being shown pictures of sheep and having an Oriental 
shepherd's methods described? What words in this 
psalm are not in a five-year-old's vocabulary? What 
ideas are not within his experience? What emotions, 
what motives or desires ? 

4. Illustrate other points made in this chapter. 



CHAPTER VII 

REVELING IN IMAGINATION 

Fore-Exercise 

1. Visit a kindergarten, if possible, and note exactly 
what the children do in the free-play period. Are the 
activities mainly for the enjoyment of motion ; for ac- 
quiring skill ; to construct something ; to represent 
something? Do the children act out stories they have 
heard? If so, is it with words or actions chiefly? 

2. Show a child of four a new picture book. What 
does he want to know about the pictures ? What ques- 
tions does he ask ? What stories will he tell you about 
them ? What stories will he tell about the familiar pic- 
tures in an old book? 

3. Did you ever have an imaginary companion? If 
so, at what age? Was it -a child, an adult, of your own 
sex, human, or fantastic ? 

4. When you played horse, or car conductor, or 
with dolls at about five, did you copy what you had seen 
adult drivers, conductors, mothers do, or did you invent 
something new? 

5. Did you then play in a group with other chil- 
dren, or mostly by yourself? 

6. What do you notice on these last two questions in 
the play of children four to six years old ? What dif- 
ference might it make to a child that age to be the 
youngest of several in a family? The oldest? An 
only child ? 

The dramatic play period. — Some people have 
called the age from three to six the play period, not 
meaning by that, of course, that children of other ages 

69 



70 A Study of the Little Child 

do not play, but that there is some predominant feature 
of the activities of this period that makes it different 
from the others. Let us see what personal reminiscence 
and casual observation will disclose concerning these 
same activities. 

If your memory will carry you back to when you 
were somewhere about five years old, recall what were 
the interests that stood out most sharply. Ask your- 
self the questions at the head of this chapter and see if 
you can get any clear answers to them. Ask several 
people the same, and pool your results. Watch little 
folks at play out of doors, too, and see what they are 
doing. Four or five hours spent in this way at differ- 
ent times ought to give a sympathetic insight and ap- 
preciation of the interests of this period ; and for good 
interpretations in books, you will do well to get hold of : 
Lee, Play in Education; Fiske, Boy Life and Self -Gov- 
ernment; Ella Lyman Cabot, Seven Ages of Childhood, 
and see what those authors have to say about children 
from foiw to six. 

In the first place, you will remember or see that, 
apart from the necessities of eating and sleeping, the 
one great business of life just then is to play. Not yet 
are felt the responsibilities of set tasks ; not yet has 
come the social life of the schoolroom ; not yet is the 
demand that learning shall be from books. Children 
now enjoy a good deal of freedom in the bestowal of 
their time, especially as they have somewhat outgrown 
the more constant supervision given the two-year-old 
toddler; and all of their time, practically, is spent in 
play. 



Reveling in Imagination 71 

Play is individual. — In the second place, children 
are rank individualists in their play. Even in company 
with other children four-year-olds really play by them- 
selves. True, they may coax daddy into tossing a ball, or 
into being the bone which the "dog" will eat ; or they 
may be coerced by an.older sister into holding and turn- 
ing the rope for her to skip, or playing baby when she 
plays house. But it is their game in which daddy will 
serve a turn, or sister's game part of which- is enjoyed. 
There is not the collaboration nor the group spirit which 
will be natural later. They do not know how to give 
and take, how to wait their turn, how to share their 
toys. All these things they will learn, in part at least, 
before they are six, especially as they meet little groups 
their own age in kindergarten ; but the learning will 
come hard very often with many occasions of smart- 
ing jealousy, greedy desire, thwarted purpose leading 
to tears, slaps, storms. How gentle and sympathetic 
we older folks need to be when these early difficult les- 
sons in the art of living together come ! Just here is the 
foundation of such morality as fair and honorable acts, 
ready sympathy, real generosity. Only as children 
realize by first-hand experience what they do want done 
to them, and how their fellows — not the folks in the 
grown-up world, but their fellows — act when they don't 
do to them what is desired, can they get the concrete 
meaning of what we later sum up for them in the words 
of the Golden Rule. 

Rhythmic play. — Such group games as are en- 
joyed at this age are largely those played in a ring, with 
singing, walking, or skipping round, simple actions re- 



72 A Study of the Little Child 

peated in concert by all. Words and movements are 
both strongly rhythmic, and generally work up to a 
surprise climax, such as stamping, tumbling down, 
pirouetting, shouting, chasing some one, or whatever 
special action the words suggest. The whole sequence 
is gone over and over perhaps a dozen or more times 
with every evidence of delight, whether the words are 
understood or not, so long as there is marked rhythm. 
Even in solitary play children enjoy rhythmic move- 
ment. Notice how the feet are swung, or little chants are 
sung, or there is a passion for being in the swing. 

Imaginative play. — In the third place, children 
are, as we have seen, hourly gaining new information 
in their questing eagerness, and acquiring new words 
and' meanings to clarify their ideas and help them ex- 
press themselves. Experiences are being stored up, and, 
as soon as convenient, brought out and examined for 
better acquaintance. Things done and seen and heard, 
also those heard about, are better remembered than ever 
before ; added to which is the pleasure in the power of 
bringing back these happenings at will, thinking them 
over in imagination, imitating, them from memory when 
they are no longer visibly present to be copied. This 
thinking over, this examining, is as definite as possi- 
ble, is, in fact, acting the experience over again in dra- 
matic play. Literally, they re-present things. Only in 
this way can children make real to themselves the true 
inwardness of what they see and hear. They must live 
over again and again in imitative way what such things 
as horses, dogs, boats, trains, the wind, the stream, fire- 
men, policemen, mothers actually do. Thus they begin 



Reveling in Imagination 73 

to understand what these are by being each in turn. 
Not through books but through impersonation is the 
learning done. 

Through pictures and stories they are introduced to 
such characters as fairies, kings and queens, Indians, 
bears, wolves, giants, and so on, not to mention Peter 
Rabbit, Red Riding Hood, and similar heroes and hero- 
ines. These too must be learned by entering vividly 
into their lives, acting as they acted, feeling as they 
felt. From this, it is but a short step to either being 
one of them for days and weeks at a time, or making up 
a character which is new and different. Indeed, even 
before this age many children, particularly first or only 
children, have had an imaginary companion. This 
slave of the lamp coming at imagination's call has the 
outstanding virtues of absolute obedience to his crea- 
tor's slightest wish, acceptance of disagreeable respon- 
sibilities, willingness to supplement any conversation, 
share any activity, with no reproaches for neglect. 

Now let us consider first of all the possible dangers 
in all this, then the mistakes grown-ups may make, then 
some of the values to child life of this dramatic, im- 
aginative play. 

Possible dangers of undirected imagination. — 
There are some few points to be guarded against in this 
period. First is the danger that the world of fancy 
may become so engrossing that children's attention is 
given too seldom to objective things, and so the power 
to tell real things from fancied things does not get 
trained as it should. The glamour of invention sheds a 
false light on matters of fact, hiding their reality, till 



74 A Study of the Little Child 

children do not see, or believe, or remember things as 
they are. Second, in the vivid world of make-believe, 
things are made to happen as the little actors wish ; and 
they try to extend this delightful control to happenings 
in the world of ought-to-believe, till they run the risk 
of not distinguishing what actually happened from what 
they wish had or had not happened — much to the dis- 
tress of the mother sometimes, who thinks her child is 
a confirmed liar. Third, responsibility for deeds may 
be easily shifted to the shoulders of the obliging im- 
aginary companion, children thereby missing the logical 
relation between conduct and consequences, promises 
and performance. One other result, partly of the first 
danger, partly of their suggestibility and credulity of 
the stories told them, is that many children suffer from 
fears of things which have no real harmful existence, 
or no proximity. Who cannot recall the agonies of ter- 
ror at the bogy man, the Thing under the bed, the 
Devil, the black bear, jerking shadows, and so on? 

Remedy for the dangers. — The way to counteract 
these dangers is to give more and more opportunity for 
contact with real things ; to know by touch and sight 
and movement more about dark corners, and shadows, 
to reassure by daily experience that witches and wolves 
do not get into our houses. Another way is to distin- 
guish always whether it is a true or a "pretend" story 
you are telling, and to be sure the children do the same ; 
also to let them have a chance to tell both. This will 
help too in learning what a truthful report is. They 
should be practiced in doing something and telling ex- 
actly what was done, where a thing is, who did it first, 



Reveling in Imagination 75 

what they saw. There should also be the pleasure of 
deliberately inventing a story to tell, which both narra- 
tor and audience know is a product of fancy. Also, re- 
sponsibility must be learned by being held to account 
for small tasks, for obedience, for remembering to do 
things a certain way, to put things in a certain place, by 
being trusted with little commissions. Reliability in 
deeds must be rewarded, and untrustworthiness must 
miss a reward or meet some displeasure. Reliability in 
words and in interpretations will thus be trained with- 
out crushing the spirit of the young artist inventor. 

Adults' mistakes. — There is first the error of 
thinking children are willfully lying when they indulge 
in romancing, as above mentioned. Unless there is in- 
tent to deceive or a cowardly escape from blame, there 
is no real lie in the wonderful reports they will bring. 
The remedy is, as indicated, in a careful distinction by 
both adults and children of when and where to stick 
to facts, and when fancy is permissible. Second, there 
is the failure to enter at all into this colorful world, but 
to see only a purloined umbrella where they see swords 
or hobby horses ; to hear only an irritating noise when 
a hyena or fearsome dragon should be recognized ; to 
speak to a little boy or girl when it is really the grocer 
or Goldilocks who should be addressed. Thrice blessed 
the adult who can transform his prosaic attitude, be- 
come even as a little child, and share the play. An- 
other error is in reading into the children's spontaneous 
actions any desire to show off, or create an effect upon 
an audience. Rather is the tendency, as we have seen, 
to explore, to find out, to gain control of ideas, to share 



76 A Study of the Little Child 

intimately the feelings of the things and people they 
see and hear about. Any attempt to criticize the per- 
formance, to make children self-conscious, to rehearse 
effects for others to approve, is a violation of their na- 
ture. So also is it a mistake to provide very elaborate, 
realistic toys as stage accessories. The simpler these 
things are the more children's imagination can do with 
them, the more varied parts they can assume, the more 
serviceable they are. A small chair, for instance, may 
be a cart, a boat, a throne, a castle, a bridge, a horse, a 
bear, as the players wish, whereas a perfect model en- 
gine is much more limited in its possibilities. Simi- 
larly, a simple doll, or block of wood is to be preferred 
to a mechanically perfect contrivance that will function 
in one way only. 

Values to child-life. — One great opportunity, or 
perhaps necessity arising from this imaginative play, is 
to see that the children have good models to imitate, 
worthy of being lived over and absorbed. The selec- 
tion of stories told, and characters familiarized which 
provides the stock of material from which the players 
will draw must be carefully made. Interest in all sorts 
of people and things may be aroused by telling about 
them, showing pictures of them, supplying details of 
what they do, what they use, what they say, telling the 
same thing over and over till the children are so full of 
the impressions that they spontaneously start to express 
themselves in slight imitative form or in more extended 
play. Through this too comes the beginning of true 
sympathy with other lives, acting and feeling as others 
act and feel, entering into their spirit. Along with it 



Reveling in Imagination 77 

too comes the opportunity to name actions brave, hon- 
est, kind, fair, careful, polite, and the like, and by atti- 
tude to convey approval of them and disapproval of 
their opposites. Thus a concrete meaning is given to 
these terms for the children, and also a knowledge of 
the social sanction or disfavor for such conduct. 

Questions for Class Discussion 

1. How could you tell the story of Miriam and the 
baby Moses so as to present interesting models of value 
to children ? 

2. Collect samples of dramatic episodes provided 
for Beginners in the ordinary Children's Day, or Christ- 
mas service. Criticize them from the point of view of : 

(a) Those that are educative. 

(b) Those that violate child nature at this age. 

(c) Those that are silly. 

(d) Those designed to appeal to the spectators rather 
than to express child thought and feeling. 

3. In what ways has play at this age a moral value ? 



CHAPTER VIII 
ATTITUDES TOWARD PEOPLE 

Fore-Exercise 

1. Recall what was said in Chapter II about ideas 
of right and wrong, and in Chapter IV about response 
to new authority. What does that suggest with regard 
to the topic of this chapter? 

2. Find out from the parents of the Beginners what, 
if any, little responsibilities are intrusted to the chil- 
dren in the home. 

Imitation. — We have seen how children in their 
play will reveal what has been interesting and attractive 
to them by copying the movements, making the sounds, 
and, in general, acting as the model acted. We know 
too, that at first they reproduce chiefly what they have 
seen and heard at first hand, and less frequently, during 
these early years, will they include in their repertoire 
the unseen characters from the stories they are told 
about soldiers, giants, fairies. Some unimaginative 
children never wish to imitate these hearsay people. 
Other overimaginative children prefer them, or else 
roles which they invent for themselves, to mimicking 
any objective, outside-in-the-world person. One little 
girl still under two developed two imaginary com- 
panions from a simple game of house, nurse, and 
mother, and thereafter, till well over six, spent most of 
her waking hours telling herself a continued story and 

78 



Attitudes Toward People 79 

acting it out, with relatively little of observation which 
might have led to more varied imitations. We may al- 
most divide children into "inside" and "outside" types 
so far as their imagination is concerned. The former 
are likely to be underdeveloped in observation at this 
period, and probably in a. social way later. The lat- 
ter appear more active and pick up more informa- 
tion. 

Besides this purposeful imitation for the fun of 
knowing how it feels to act as letter carrier, car con- 
ductor, mother, carpenter, we have to reckon with the 
unconscious imitation of people lived with daily. 
Phraseology, voice modulations, gestures, facial expres- 
sions, all are picked up readily; and, all unknowingly, 
the mother finds her habitual ways of speaking revealed 
to the community through her child. Jean begins her 
pieces of information invariably, "Now, listen, Miss 

K , are you listening to what I say?" showing 

how her own attention is secured. Ralph, whose 
mother drawls when she tries prolonged coaxing rather 
than quiet, incisive request, has developed a sing-song 
nasal whine of expostulation' in an argument to get his 
own way. Alan reflects the cheery atmosphere of his 
home in irfaking light of bumps and in smiling as soon 
as possible after any little mishap. 

What they are because of what they imitate. — 
Whether deliberately or unconsciously the four- and 
five-year-olds are fashioning themselves day by day on 
the pattern of those around them and of those presented 
in a striking way to their imaginations. It is obvious 
that it is exceedingly important to have models that are 



80 A Study of the Little Child 

worth while. Now are impressed upon the plastic 
material of the child mind attitudes that are self-seek- 
ing, actions that are dishonest, thinking that is low and 
common, talk that is coarse, or their opposites of con- 
versation that is pure, refined and informative, thinking 
that is high and noble, living that is honorable and trust- 
worthy, attitudes that inspire to social service. Now 
may be formed definite ideals such as Sally Smiles, the 
Jolly Goops, mother's brave boy, Jesus' helper. Now 
is the time to differentiate between the strange little girl 
who pouts and our own Laura whose mouth turns up 
at the corners. Thus we use the imagination definitely 
to shape efforts, holding up a desired characteristic in 
personalized form to help control conduct. 

Keen sense of others' opinions. — From the con- 
stant appeal, "See me do it," "See what I made," we 
need not infer that children are- showing off. Rather 
is it that they wish someone to share in their own ela- 
tion over the conquest of some physical obstacle. It is 
so mighty an achievement to have jumped down that 
far, so wonderful to have built the tower of blocks so 
high that some grown person must be brought to swell 
the triumph. Notice that it is a grown-up person, gen- 
erally, at this age. By the admiration meted out to 
them children's confidence in their own prowess is 
strengthened. Success must be commented on before 
it is fully felt as success. "See, I didn't spill any, did 
I, mama?" Since the big folks direct the little folks' 
actions in so many ways it is natural that actions of all 
sorts, behavior as well as athletic stunts, should be re- 
ferred to the habitual court of appeals for judgment. 



Attitudes Toward People 81 

This is the way their sense of values is developed, by the 
way others regard the conduct, by the way others treat 
them. Hence they listen for criticisms — indeed, invite 
them. "I did that nicely, didn't I?" "It was good of 
me to do that, wasn't it?" "He was a brave man, 
wasn't he?" "Isn't Morris a naughty boy to do that?" 
Notice too how sensitive little children are to being 
laughed at. How overwhelmed they can be when an 
earnest inquiry, funny only to the adults, is greeted with 
shouts of merriment ! How unhappy a ten-year-old 
tease can make a smaller sister only the little one can 
tell, and that when she herself has grown considerably 
older. So responsive are they, opening to the sunshine 
of friendliness and- shrinking at the nipping wind of 
ridicule, that it would seem a matter of supreme moment 
to provide the right sort of criticism for these growing 
plants. 

Desire for praise. — Not only do children seek 
others' expression of opinions, but they will go out of 
their way to do things in hope of the reward of praise. 
An instance of the force of this hope in shaping con- 
duct was given in the question following Qiapter II. 
Marian's mother telling visitors in her presence the 
smart things she has said will stimulate effort to be yet 
smarter, with most undesirable results usually. Pat's 
mother telling Mrs. Casey over the fence what a help 
to her Pat is getting to be, is using "blarney" in a wise 
way. 

Both for training their critical thinking and for 
motivating their conduct we should not hesitate to ex- 
press approval, and to name certain qualities very 



82 A Study of the Little Child 

definitely, such as careful, quick, brave, kind. These 
terms may be applied to the children themselves, helping 
to rank them, in their own thinking, with people who do 
the same sort of things. In telling stories too we can 
assist this valuation of conduct by phrases, such as 
"Robert was a boy who always told the truth, so he 

said " ; "This giant was so good-natured that, of 

course, he helped them at once." However, we should 
avoid naming undesirable qualities, if possible, such as 
rude, cruel, a lie, but use instead the form not polite, not 
true, with appropriate tones of deprecation. If unde- 
sirable behavior on the part of the children is to be 
commented on, we should never fit the adjective on to 
them, but to their conduct. It is not that Helen is a 
bad girl, but the act is bad and to be avoided in the 
future. Grown-up and Helen together consider the act 
and its bad consequences, and try to discover ways to 
remember not to repeat that bad act. 

After all, this wish for approval is universal in hu- 
man nature. What our families, our friends, our busi- 
ness or professional associates think of us, and how they 
treat us in consequence, is of vital moment to each one 
of us, and a most powerful motive for conduct. The 
particular thing to remember about the four- and five- 
year-olds is that they are influenced less by the opinion 
of their equals in age now than they are by that of 
adults. It is, then, the golden time to lay the founda- 
tions deep and strong of the character that is to be. 
The instinctive tendencies which lead to desirable habits 
must be approved in unmistakable terms. There is lit- 
tle danger, at this age, of "spoiling" a child by too much 



Attitudes Toward People 83 

praise. He may well be encouraged by even exag- 
gerated commendation to further efforts along the same 
lines. Condemnation should be equally unhesitating, 
though not exaggerated. In no uncertain tones we 
should make clear our position with regard to Things 
that are Not Done. It is thus that we set up an emo- 
tional bias against anti-social acts and predispose chil- 
dren to avoid them. 

Dread of disapproval. — Children of even three 
have developed sufficiently to exercise some measure of 
conscious self-control. From babyhood davs tumbles 
have helped them learn to balance their bodies, and 
bruises have restrained them from hitting at random on 
hard objects. Besides this accidental training of the 
physical environment there has gone along more sys- 
tematic training by the people in the social environment. 
Displeasure, associated with certain types of acts, has 
taught them the wisdom of avoiding such. Now that 
the power to remember and ability to talk about things, 
and the power to picture things to themselves has de- 
veloped pretty well, there is possible a control of ac- 
tions not only by seeing and hearing results of conduct, 
but by remembering previous occurrences and anticipat- 
ing them again. By three years old, in other words, 
there is some slight feeling of responsibility growing. 
Ada cries when she breaks a cup, remembering what 
was said and done before on a similar occasion. Elsie 
may check herself when about to touch the big scissors, 
not because she has ever cut herself, but because the 
attempt to touch them before has always been coupled 
with a firm command to leave them alone. Five-year- 



84 A Study of the Little Child 

old Jim is afraid to go home because he has lost some 
of the pennies the grocer gave him in change, and he 
expects blame. Mildred shows consciousness of guilt 
when she is found three blocks from home after having 
been warned to stay in front of the house. She may 
have been punished before, and she is afraid now. As 
she develops, the memory of the prohibition will come 
up, not too late as it did this time, but at the same time 
as the thought of going round the corner, and the mem- 
ory of the consequence of disobeying will in time serve 
to deter her, as in the case of Elsie with the scissors. 
Wisely treated, she will connect the feeling of discom- 
fort with the wrongdoing itself, not with the person 
who makes the consequences unpleasant. Unfor- 
tunately, all children are not so wisely treated, so that 
what should be only the in-between stage of fear of 
being found out remains the final stage. Then the im- 
pulse to conceal is, of course, enormously strengthened. 
Both the timid child and the very imaginative may eas- 
ily learn the art of subterfuge, though their early at- 
tempts at deception are unskillful enough not to suc- 
ceed, as a rule. For both these types, and the bold, 
defiant kind, it is of the utmost importance that this 
impulse to conceal be checked, unless we wish a moral 
coward or a sly trickster to grow up. It must never 
pay to deny wrongdoing. The consequences of false- 
hood must be far worse than the results of the con- 
cealed deed would have been. Conversely, emphatic 
approval must be shown when children, albeit fright- 
ened, admit their fault. The fundamental position is, 
as outlined above, entire sympathy with the little 



Attitudes Toward People 85 

criminal, wholesome disgust at the act, helpful sugges- 
tion for the future. 

Fear of not living up to the ideal will work too. As 
the mental pictures of what a brave soldier does become 
vivid, Kenneth will help himself conquer his tendency 
to be a cry-baby by the thought of father's disappoint- 
ment not to find his soldier-boy to-day. Dick remem- 
bers to say "Thank you," and "Please," or else his hos- 
tess will think he is not a little gentleman. Louise makes 
a real effort to come out of the sulks so that mother may 
not miss her jolly chum. 

Helpfulness, desire to be doing. — We have seen 
how eagerly little children touch and handle the things 
about them, and how faithfully they copy others' action. 
Left untrained, these traits may develop into destruc- 
tiveness, or at least bear no fruit of any educational 
value. Judiciously tended, however, we find here the 
germs of constructiveness, that may blossom into genu- 
ine helpfulness. Fingers that like to tear paper may 
tear it into picture forms to be mounted with other pic- 
tures into scrapbooks. People who like playing visitor 
may take these scrapbooks to little children who have 
none, in hospital, day nursery, or orphan home. Hands 
that are so busy piling blocks may also learn to pile 
dishes while helping mothers wash them. Little bodies 
that move about so much may go on errands of simple 
fetch-and-carry for tired people. In addition to playing 
the street-cleaner they may be of service in helping tidy 
the room. 

By sharing in the family life in this responsible way, 
and to the extent of their powers in the community life, 



86 A Study of the Little Child 

they begin to learn true citizenship where each serves 
the group for the welfare of all. By doing things with 
mother for father, with older children for mother, with 
the teacher and class for other children or old people, 
the instinctive desire for activity is turned into the di- 
rection of experience that is worth while because it de- 
velops attitudes of sympathetic understanding and 
habits of helpfulness. 

Questions for Discussion 

1. Collect illustrations of such characters as Dolly 
Dumps, the Cheerful Chubbies, the Tidy Tots in litera- 
ture for children that may be helpful in forming ideals 
and habits. 

2. In what sense is it true that sympathy is a prod- 
uct of imitation ? Illustrate. 

3. Are we inclined to love people more who do many 
things for us, or for whom we render service? What 
does this suggest in awakening love in little children for 
each other ; for God the Father ? 

4. What schemes are worked out in your Begin- 
ners' Department which give opportunity to the children 
for little acts of helpfulness? What could wisely be 
introduced ? 



CHAPTER IX 
MODIFICATIONS OF CHARACTER 
Fore-Exercise 

1. Look back to Chapter I for causes of individual 
differences, to II for development of ideas of right and 
wrong, to III for possible sources of motive, to VIII 
for results of imitation. 

2. Collect from any previous chapters any titles of 
the laws of learning, or any illustrations of them. 

3. £earn some new, simple habit yourself to replace 
one you already have ; for example, use the left hand for 
the drinking utensil at table ; keep some frequently used 
object in a new place. Keep count of (a) the number 
of times you revert to the old habit before remember- 
ing the new; (b) how soon you remember just in time 
to avoid the old habit ; (c) how long it takes before you 
can do the new thing without having to attend to it. 
Compare your notes with others in the class. 

We have seen how busy children are between four 
and six years old learning new things by their eyes and 
hands, clarifying their understanding by the questions 
they ask, adding to the vocabulary in which they ex- 
press themselves, and living over again in imaginative 
play the actions of those that have most interested them. 
Now, to learn means to make changes in oneself ; and 
by all they are learning it follows that some of these 
changes have a big influence on the character they are 
forming. Character, or what people are in relation to 
others, is made up of what they habitually do, and the 

87 



88 A Study of the Little Child 

ideals which control their actions. Let us see how little 
children are forming ideals and habits during the age 
period we are discussing. We may consider, first, the 
factors due to inner growth more largely, as these shape 
their ways of feeling and thinking, and, second, those 
due more to environment. 

Individuality. — The first reason we will notice for 
character growth is the fact that they become increas- 
ingly independent physically. They learn to get along 
without so much help as formerly from older people in 
matters of eating, dressing, going out. This alone 
tends to foster independence in other ways, so that chil- 
dren may often resent any offers of help which seem 
to them more like interference. It also paves the way 
for new interests. Every new skill gained leads to 
greater independence, opens up new possibilities. 
Every habit learned leaves children's attention that 
much more free to start learning something else. 

Second is the fact that they have a much clearer idea 
of self than they had at two or three years of age. Up 
to that time they had to learn that all parts of their 
bodies, whether felt or seen or heard, really meant "me." 
Then when beginning to move about they found the joy 
of making things happen, of being a cause of noises, of 
shadows, and so forth. Learning to talk, and when to 
use the pronoun "I" helped in the idea of self, as has 
also owning certain things in the way of toys or table 
utensils. Now is the time when they try out the limits 
of their social selves, as in babyhood they found out the 
limits of their bodily selves. And as their bodies were 
defined by meeting resistance, so their character selves 



Modifications of Character 89 

learn too. By finding their interests and purposes now 
running with, and now against those of other people 
they discover how far they can go without disagreeable 
results. Have you never seen a four-year-old half 
playfully, but determinedly, doing just exactly what he 
has been told not to do, with a wary eye on authority 
to see how much he may dare ? The difficulty in learn- 
ing comes in having to stand either the unpleasantness 
of being thwarted in a purpose, or that of the conse- 
quences of running counter to others' purposes. It 
seems a choice between two evils, and a difficult choice 
at best. Many fits of obstinacy or sulks are really a 
sort of prickly hedgehog condition in which children 
find themselves unable to make this choice between two 
disagreeables. The more immediate disappointment of 
being prevented in following out their own inclination 
generally looms larger than the anticipation of a pen- 
alty, so that it tends to produce sulks. The necessity of 
conforming at once to the purposes of somebody else 
tends more to what is called obstinacy — really a frus- 
trated, inhibited state. A sudden attempt to enforce 
conformity, thus interfering with liberty of action, is 
more likely, as we have seen, to throw a child into a 
screaming rage. Something depends here on inherited 
temperament as to which a child most frequently does. 
Our point is that all three modes are reactions of the 
self against other selves, by which the boundaries of the 
sphere of that self are slowly felt out. 

A third cause due to inner growth that helps in char- 
acter forming is the fact that their power to recall ex- 
periences is rapidly increasing, and the fact that their 



90 A Study of the Little Child 

imagination is sufficiently developed so that they can 
picture what may happen again in the light of what hap- 
pened before, in consequence of an- act. Thus they can 
profit by past experience in a conscious way, not in the 
more automatic way of the earlier years. Self-control, 
then, can be more rapidly developed. There are sev- 
eral well-marked stages of this control in forming a 
habit. First, the memory of the probable conse- 
quences comes after the wrong act is complete, too late 
to prevent it, but in time to arouse fear of a repetition 
of the former painful sequence, and perhaps to re- 
enforce the tendency to hide. Second, the memory of 
the law may come at the same time as the chance to 
break it, when it becomes a battle between the strength 
of the impulse and the imagination of the consequence. 
Third, the impulse having been sufficiently often 
checked loses in strength, and, when felt, is ignored 
even though the imagination is not consciously called 
into play. Look back to the illustrations in the pre- 
vious chapter of children in these various stages of 
forming a habit. A still later stage is reached when 
thinking of a result will make children remember some- 
thing that ought to be done in time to do it, instead of 
simply refraining from an act. Either hope of reward 
or fear of displeasure may bring this stage, the former 
motive the more quickly, however. 

A fourth factor in their growth, already mentioned, 
is the imitative and imaginative tendency which leads 
children to dramatize tlie occupations around them, and 
serves as a mirror to reflect the inner feel of the joy of 
these occupations. Thus children learn to share others' 



Modifications of Character 91 

feelings and find the basis for sympathy, for experienc- 
ing in themselves the excitements, the hopes, the fears, 
the desires that motivate other selves. If we wish, we 
can draw upon this power by interesting them in all 
sorts of people's needs, and direct this sympathy into 
acts of real helpfulness. They may be led to plan ac- 
tions that will give others pleasure. A Beginners 
class was glad to go with a first-grade class to take 
flowers to the Home where many grannies and grand- 
pas lived who didn't have any grandchildren of their 
own to visit them. This sharing of activities that give 
joy to others brings its own joy even to five-year-olds, 
and trains them in being like Jesus who "went about 
doing good." It also prepares for the somewhat later 
stage of development when children will think ahead 
and give up doing something they wish because it 
would harm or grieve somebody else. In between, 
comes the stage of giving up because it will bring pleas- 
ure to somebody else. Our Beginners may well be en- 
couraged to give some of their toys for other children 
who have none, or to help make little gifts that will 
bring pleasure. 

A fifth factor, due also to better memory and 
stronger imagination, is the feeling of responsibility 
that is awakened. Sometimes this is gradual, as when 
there is habitual care of a pet or a younger brother or 
sister, and good home training in being held account- 
able for little tasks. Sometimes it may come rather 
suddenly, if in an emergency a child is thrown on his 
own resources. A need for a decision as to the best 
thing to do, a moral crisis calling for judgment, or an 



92 A Study of the Little Child 

overwhelming realization of disastrous results of a deed 
may mark the moment when this feeling of responsi- 
bility dawns. 

Of course no two children are exactly alike. Just 
as they do not grow at the same rate physically, so we 
cannot expect them to grow at the same rate morally. 
Their physical stature may vary, at rive years old, from 
thirty-eight to forty-three inches; their moral stature is 
sure to show a similar variation. And as one part of the 
body takes a spurt in growth while others have a rela- 
tively restful period, so their characters may grow piece- 
meal too, the formation of one set of habits absorbing 
most of the energy for a while, while others are seem- 
ingly neglected. Children grow mentally at differing 
rates too, let alone the fact that they have inherited very 
different intellectual capacities. An idea which the ma- 
jority grasp readily may be beyond the mental reach of 
some few altogether. A habit quickly formed by one 
child may take another three or four times as long to 
learn. The differences in sensibility to fatigue are 
equally striking ; and this affects character modification 
in that some children are unable to persevere with one 
occupation a tenth of the time that some others can at- 
tend, and so are less vividly impressed, and less able to 
carry away memories that will be helpful. 

In conquering fears, in overcoming shyness, in gain- 
ing control of quick temper, in inhibiting the impulse to 
cry, in these and in many other ways affecting volition, 
there are very significant differences in rate of growth. 
By six years old children will be more unlike than at 
four, because of the interworking of these factors in 



Modifications of Character 93 

their inner growth. Some will be still of the average 
social age of four, we will say, others of the social age 
of eight. For that very reason it is not really possible 
to present a picture of "the typical child of five to six" 
so far as character is concerned, however nearly we 
may measure the average mental attainment. All that 
has been pointed out is the variety of factors that have 
been at work to help development. This must not be 
interpreted to mean that every child of five will have 
conquered his fears, formed habits of obedience, become 
sympathetic, gained self-control. Indeed, when we 
compare these little ones with those of eight and twelve 
years old, and think too of our own shortcomings ; 
when some strong instinct, some powerful emotion in- 
terferes sadly with our self-control, we realize that they 
have, after all, done no more than make a beginning in 
forming the character that is to be. But how impor- 
tant that beginning is, when a slight bend in the wrong 
direction may mean a crookedness of growth, as in the 
case of any young tree ; while the clean, beautiful sym- 
metry in which we so delight depends on sturdy growth, 
and a good start in every respect. However, all this 
growth has been conditioned, of course, by influences 
in the environment, and we must now consider these 
briefly. 

Environment. — A potent factor in modification of 
character is to be found in the social environment. Just 
what children will learn depends upon the kind of peo- 
ple around them. Wise training will bring about desir- 
able changes, and at an earlier age than for those chil- 
dren who are brought up by ignorant or selfish people. 



94 A Study of the Little Child 

As we have noticed before, the members of the family 
wield the most important influence in shaping- the char- 
acter, first along emotional lines, and increasingly in 
this period from four to six in ways of thinking and in- 
terpreting actions. The attitudes taken by those near- 
est the children determine their ideas of right and 
wrong, instill fear of consequences, inspire hope of re- 
ward and so supply motives for conduct. Their own 
behavior too is quickly imitated by the children, serv- 
ing as a model by which other people's actions are 
judged. "Daddy says so," "We don't do that at our 
house," "Mother lets us do that," may be heard fre- 
quently quoted when little people go visiting. Seeing 
others hold to a course of action because of a promise 
made helps fix the status of the spoken word. Being 
rewarded for fulfilling a task in the absence of anyone 
to supervise helps embody the ideal of trustworthiness 
in deeds. Hearing anyone promptly decline to engage 
in an activity because it is wrong, or would hurt some- 
body else, defines an attitude of judging deeds by their 
outcome. 

Along with this goes the greater diversity of ex- 
periences that comes from wider social contacts. As 
their physical independence and their social impulses 
lead them further from home, they learn different ways 
of acting from other children in other homes with other 
standards. Better ways may be learned, and occasion- 
ally brought over into home life; but at this age little 
children do not learn courtesy, obedience, generosity as 
such in a generalized way, but as specific habits in con- 
nection with specific people. Janet will mind Sadie's 



Modifications of Character 95 

mother while she defies her own with impunity. Philip 
will play happily in company with Jim, but disagree 
continuously with Andy. Worse ways may be learned 
too. Often we hear a shocked mother wondering wher- 
ever Tommy picked up such ways ; bad words seem as 
contagious as measles, undesirable habits as adhesive as 
sticky mud. 

Contact with other children brings a special type of 
modification, as we have earlier discussed. These con- 
flicts of self with other child-selves, painful though they 
may be, lead to the knowledge not only of how to be 
quicker at snatching at a coveted object but also how to 
wait one's turn. Not only do children learn how irri- 
tating it is when others won't follow their own plan, 
but also what enjoyment may come from sharing 
playthings, or following the lead of some other 
child. 

As children move in this wider environment they 
pick up all sorts of information, some of it correct, 
much of it interpreted in a queer way. They discover 
that all they hear is not to be relied on ; so that, while a 
four-year-old is almost completely credulous, a six- 
year-old is not quite so ready to believe everybody im- 
plicitly, particularly if he has met with much teasing of 
the sort called "fooling" from older children. While he 
is still unable, from his inexperience, to judge of the 
worth of the statements themselves, he may have come 
to look upon certain people as those who can always, 
or only sometimes, be believed. 

Certain principles may be formulated as to how to 
help children form habits. ( 1 ) We must see to it that 



96 A Study of the Little Child 

they understand clearly just what is to be done. To say 
"Don't be so rude" does not help toward this clear 
idea ; whereas a few specific, positive directions, such as 
"Wait for your turn to speak till Mrs. Ellis has done 
speaking," "Go behind the visitor's chair when you 

cross the room," "Say, 'Please may I have ' 

when you ask for something," gives a definite thing to 
be done. (2) Besides this clear understanding they 
must be appealed to along the line of an interest that we 
know is strong. Here we need a close understanding 
of the interests of this age-period, and of each particu- 
lar child. Competition, desire for aesthetic products, 
symbolic significance will not prove strong motives at 
this period ; curiosity, a chance for physical activity, 
actions that can be copied, will. (3) We must provide 
opportunity to do the thing immediately after it has 
been explained and demonstrated, and whenever the 
interest attaching to it is felt. And, of course, we must 
see that the thing is done over and over till the children 
no longer have to be reminded to do it, for "it does 
itself." (4) If it is a new habit in place of an old, less 
desirable one, we must be particularly on the watch to 
remind little children at the crucial moment of what it 
is that is to be done, to prevent a slip into the old habit. 
In any case, whether re-forming, or merely forming a 
habit, there should be this watchfulness, so as to secure 
consistent practice. (5) We must make the first steps 
of the new task easy enough so that the first efforts are 
likely to be successful. Failure might discourage a 
further attempt. (6) As has been emphasized again 
and again, the result of doing the right thing must be 



Modifications of Character 97 

very definitely pleasant to the children, so that they are 
more likely to repeat the act of their own accord. 

Questions for Discussion 

1. Which is more likely to help a five-year-old form 
the habit of wiping his muddy feet, to reward him for 
doing it or to scold him for forgetting ? Why ? 

2. Describe the social environment of the children 
in your Beginners class. What people do they meet? 
What standards are held up to them ? 

3. What habits of worship do you wish your Begin- 
ners to form? How will you apply the principles for- 
mulated above? 

4. How may a teacher utilize the love of approba- 
tion in helping form moral habits ? 

5. How can you help a child get more pleasure from 
being kind and generous than the opposite ? 

6. Study the change in interests in your group be- 
tween four and six years old. 

7. Discuss the results of the experiment suggested 
in the third fore-exercise of this chapter. What insight 
does it give into habit-forming in general ? 

8. How would you help break up habits of cruelty 
in a six-year-old ? obstinacy ? How help form habits 
of truth-telling? 

9. Give illustrations of the sudden awakening to a 
feeling of responsibility? 



CHAPTER X 

RELIGIOUS GROWTH 

Fore-Exercise 

1. Can you recall your early ideas of God? What 
contributed to make them what they were? What 
helped to change them? 

2. Ask two or three children of five : "When you 
think of God, what do you think of ? What is He like ?" 
and take down what they say. 

3. Ask similarly, "Does God speak to you ever?" 
and report their answers. 

Capacity. — Have children as young as four and 
five any truly religious capacity? To answer this we 
need not only to know the nature of the children, but 
also to define our meaning of religion. Let us take it 
as a way of living, with impulse to organize life with 
reference to values proved true and to a power other 
than human. The Christian religion has a different 
concept of this power from other religions, and lays 
special stress on the social values. Our point will be, 
then, to find if in children under six there is any idea 
of God, any attempt to organize living in accordance 
with values, any growth of the social instincts. We 
will take up these questions in reverse order. 

The chief instincts that function in religious develop- 
ment are fear, curiosity, the sex instinct, the aesthetic 
group, gregariousness, jealousy, kindliness, responses 
to approval and disapproval, sympathy, the parental in- 



Religious Growth 99 

stincts. Of these, not all are equally prominent at this 
age. We have seen already that fear plays a large part 
in a young child's life, that it has to be redirected into 
■ fearing very different things from those which origi- 
nally cause it. It finds permanent expression in fear 
of social disapproval, which, with its opposite, love of 
approbation, has also been discussed as a motive for 
conduct. Jealousy is very strong, but kindliness and 
tender care also find expression, as does gregariousness, 
at least in the pleasure children show in each other's 
company. Sympathy is nascent, and curiosity is ram- 
pant. 

Other characteristics that help toward forming re- 
ligious ideas or starting religious acts are their very 
great credulity and suggestibility, their ready imitation 
of others' acts, their love of making things happen, and 
their easy creation of an imaginary companion. Some 
emotions that help toward a religious experience are 
the joy in reconciliation after naughtiness, the relief of 
submission after passionate rebellion, the joy in meet- 
ing after an absence, the joy in sharing activity with 
others, the satisfaction of creative activity, the delight 
in giving protecting care. 

We have seen that there is a growth during this 
period in self-control, in interest in other children, in 
learning to share and to take turns easily, in power to 
help. Good ideals will promote this growth and bring 
about organization of conduct even when the ideas are 
not very consistent. We may have truth in deeds be- 
fore it comes always in words. There will be specific 
habits of gratitude and politeness formed before there 



100 A Study of the Little Child 

is much appreciation of the ideals which motivate adults 
in like cases. We cannot expect grown-up standards 
to work for little people, but in so far as they can think 
and feel and act they are certainly starting to organize, 
their ways of living. Inner growth is shown (1) by 
the capacity to form and carry out purposes, and (2) 
by the gradually improving quality of those purposes. 
In both these respects we have undeniable evidence of 
growth during this period. Though instruction and 
religious thinking find a bigger place in their lives later 
on, they are now quite capable of religious feelings and 
impressions. By the attitude at home and in Sunday- 
school they may come to join in the social experience of 
acts of worship, and acts of helpful service. All this 
answers satisfactorily from the first two points of view 
whether these young children show any evidence of re- 
ligious capacity. 

Questionings. — The need for organizing is shown 
further in their queries. Upon the replies they get will 
be founded their ideas, qualified as these must be by the 
very limited experience which serves to interpret these 
replies. Here are some more samples of the questions 
children put: "Where is God?" "Who made God?" 
"Is God like us?" "Was God ever a boy?" "Does 
God live in the sky sometimes and in the church just 
on Sundays?" "Is he on the earth too?" "How can 
God see in the dark?" "Who helps God up in heaven ?" 
"Is God like the air if he is everywhere?" Problems 
of life and death, as well as of doctrine, bother the little 
philosophers : "Who was the mother of the very first 
baby?" "Who was God's father?" "Does Jesus come 



Religious Growth 101 

down out of the sky and fetch you when you die?". 
"Does your soul have wings to go to heaven with?" 
"If people's bodies are buried, do their heads go to 
heaven?" Problems of good and evil are felt, too, as 
shown in: "Did God make the Devil?" "If the Devil 
says he's sorry, won't God forgive him ?" "Does Jesus 
love bad boys?" "If I wanted to be bad, could God 
make it that I'd be good?" 

Wonder. — There is so much around little children 
that they do not understand, things which cannot be 
handled, movements the cause of which cannot be seen, 
such as the wind, the power of heat and cold, that the 
emotion of wonder is very constantly felt. We do not 
know, scientifically, whether the tendency to ascribe the 
cause to God is due to the feeling of mystery surround- 
ing these forces of nature or whether it is only due to 
answers they may receive, such as "because God makes 
it do so." Certain it is that primitive man, in like 
dilemma, posits a supernatural force for things he does 
not understand, and that superstitions flourish where 
adequate knowledge is lacking. Children show won- 
der too at other people's behavior, the key to which is 
not understood. This is less often put into words, how- 
ever. It may excite fear as well as puzzlement; but 
language fails them, other than "Why does he do that?" 

Ideas of God. — Undoubtedly all their early con- 
ceptions of God are acquired from hearsay or from 
direct teaching, since there is no innate, instinctive idea 
of deity. Obviously, then, it will depend on what, if 
anything, a given child has been taught, on what words 
have been used to give him an idea, just what sort of a 



102 A Study of the Ltttle Child 

notion he has. His feelings toward God, if he has 
any, will depend partly on his interpretation of that no- 
tion, partly on the relationship he sees others around 
him have in their attitude toward the Supreme Being. 
Of course, since he has had to interpret both words and 
adjustments of others by his own understanding, it does 
not follow that the idea the parent or teacher tried to 
convey is the one actually held by the child. We may 
find Beginners who have had no instruction, no chance 
to hear anything, who consequently have no idea of 
God ; and there may be much indoctrinated children, 
with very varying conceptions. 

We may enumerate the more common conceptions as 
follows : 

(1) God is one who gives life and makes things 
grow. There is no further idea of any personal rela- 
tionship. 

(2) God made most things, such as the sun, the 
wind, the water, the stones, and makes them act the way 
they do. So far, we have a Creator, perhaps even a 
sort of magic worker. As the latter, 

(3) He may be appealed to, to make things happen 
conveniently for us, for example, to stop the rain. 

(4) Almost invariably, when thought of as a per- 
son, God is pictured as a man, probably a very old man 
with a long white beard and flowing garments. He is 
frequently gigantic in size, even tall enough to reach up 
to the sky. Here we can trace the influence of pictures, 
also a confusion with pictures of Jesus. Hence, too, 
arise some of the puzzles as to God's omnipresence, his 
watchful eye, his being in us, etc. 



Religious Growth 103 

(5) God is an exaggerated bogy man, a dread sort 
of fate, spying on our actions, lying in wait to punish 
us, preparing reproof for us constantly. 

(6) He is an amiable, unseen sort of genie or fairy 
or Santa Claus. He will do our bidding, give us won- 
derful presents, give us permission to do what we most 
want even if mother forbids it ; in short, he can be used 
by us for whatever we want, at any time. 

(Perhaps you know some adults who do not seem to 
have outgrown these conceptions of God entirely.) 

Let us contrast with these a more ethical idea of God, 
mingled though it may be at times with elements from 
these other conceptions. 

God is an unseen Companion, a Father, a Friend. He 
can be talked to freely, but always with respect, for 
he is so great and wonderful. He likes to have us tell 
him things, for he is always interested in his children. 
He gives us many things, especially help, so we must 
remember to thank him. He is sorry, and it grieves 
him when we do wrong. He has commands for us, 
just as our parents have; and commands for them too, 
since they are also his children. He belongs to us all, 
but does not have favorites, for he loves justice. He 
has work to do, and asks us to help him in that work ; 
and when we do we are all happy together. Some of 
his plans we can't understand yet, but as we get older 
and wiser, and especially as we try to help him as far 
as we can, we shall understand better. He loves beau- 
tiful things and true things, particularly in ways we act. 

Evidence of God consciousness. — Can we find 
such ideas in young children? Again the answer is, 



104 A Study of the Little Child 

Yes. A boy of five said God helped him to fight his bad 
habit of grumbling. Another explained that God 
doesn't just make you good ; you try your hardest and 
he finishes the little bit you can't do. One child brought 
a much-beloved toy to be given to some children in a 
hospital because God wanted her to, and he mightn't 
have enough without. A little girl under six knew that 
God speaks to you in your mind, not in a voice you can 
hear. Others added that he reminded you when you 
oughtn't to do things. John doesn't wait to ''say his 
prayers" at night ; when he is very happy over some- 
thing he feels he must tell God at once. Sadie inquires 
if it will help God if she helps weed the garden bed. 

Notice that for this type of idea of God as for the 
others, the ideas must somehow be given them, the atti- 
tudes must be felt and copied. They will not come by 
chance. How, then, can we develop the idea of God 
which Jesus sought to give us? After all, merely to 
tell about God does not lead children to direct knowl- 
edge. It is onlv as reaction of some sort is made in 
awakened emotion and direct activity, that real knowl- 
edge comes. Here, as elsewhere, children learn by do- 
ing. We must seek, then, to couple the ideas with their 
impulses to feel, to talk, to move and behave. To act as 
God acts is one of the chief ways of finding out God's 
nature. As for us to will to do his will is to learn of 
the doctrine, so for children to get in line with his pur- 
poses and try to carry them out is the way to the inter- 
pretation of God. Since God takes care of us, children 
must have opportunity to care for others more helpless. 
As he makes many things, and makes them do work, 



Religious Growth 105 

so they must construct and create, and put them to use. 
As he works in and through people, so they must share 
work others are doing. As he bestows gifts so must 
they too feel the joy of giving. As he fights wrong 
feelings and deeds, so must they be enlisted in similar 
warfare. As he shares his beautiful things with us, 
they must share too. As he brings happiness, so must 
they plan ways of making others happy. As he is re- 
sponsible for so much, they too must know what it is 
to be held responsible. Above all, they must share 
God's acts of loving. 

In communion with our Father we may help them 
form habits not merely of asking for favors (even the 
vague "Bless "), but of thanking, and just tell- 
ing him our thoughts. This attitude is quite as easily 
adopted as any other, and less likely to interfere with 
children's spontaneity. A model in words is often 
helpful, since we know the difficulties children have in 
language expression ; but, as stressed before, the vocab- 
ulary must be comprehensible, and, needless to urge, the 
thought so clothed comprehensible too. Some chil- 
dren, even at four, will have progressed beyond the use 
of a model form alone ; many others cling to it a year 
or two beyond six. Individual, original praying can- 
not be forced, however; children differ very much in 
this, even with the same home training. 

Truly, then, as children of this age have their place 
in their father's and mother's home, and their little tasks 
to further the home interests, so they can be about our 
Father's business along with us older ones, and "of such 
is the kingdom of heaven." 



106 A Study of the Little Child 

Questions for Discussion 

1. What results came from the fore-exercise to this 
chapter ? 

2. What might explain the confusion of a child who 
knows the Christmas story when she is taught to pray 
to Jesus for help ? 

3. How would you teach Beginners to pray? Why? 

4. Study the home atmosphere of each one of your 
Beginners. How does it help in the consciousness of 
God? How does it hinder in the idea you wish to 
form? 

5. Illustrate how the emotions described in the third 
paragraph help toward a religious consciousness. 

6. What is your interpretation of "becoming as lit- 
tle children" to enter the kingdom of heaven? 

A GOOD REFERENCE BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Ella Lyman Cabot, Seven Ages of Childhood. 
George A. Coe, The Psychology of Religion. 
George A. Coe, Social Theory of Religious Educa- 
tion. 

G. E. Dawson, The Child and His Religion. 
Hugh Hartshorne, Childhood and Character. 
E. A. Kirkpatrick, The Individual in the Making. 
J. Lee, Play in Education. 

D. R. Major, First Steps in Mental Growth. 

E. E. Mumford, The Dawn of Character. 

E. E. Mumford, The Dawn of Religion in the Mind 
of the Child. 

Norsworthy and Whitley, The Psychology of Child- 
hood. 

M. E. Rankin, A Course for Beginners in Religious 
Education. 

J. Sully, Studies of Childhood. 



